


Tanzania

by Spamberguesa



Series: The M Universe [15]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Gen, airships ahoy, because donovans are donovans, but tanzania is beautiful, careful what you wish for lorna, don't try to piss lorna off, especially not when one of them has PTSD, it just isn't, less language barriers than accent barriers, putting so many donovans in one place is not a good idea, ratiri has resigned himself to being eye candy, things have only started and geezer is already so done with everything, well that's unfortunate, you might just succeed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-20
Updated: 2019-07-12
Packaged: 2019-11-01 10:28:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 56,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17865575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spamberguesa/pseuds/Spamberguesa
Summary: The Donovan-Duncans head to Tanzania, to meet youngest brother Mick's in-laws. It's exactly as good an idea as it sounds.





	1. Chapter One

Mick wasn't at all sure this was actually a good idea, but Saida’s family had to meet his sooner or later. Things had been too chaotic when their daughter was born for a trip to be even considered, but there had been three years between Zahra (named for Saida’s mother) and baby Jamie (named for Mick’s foster-father). The world had settled down, and with it, the lives of the assorted Donovans. He could only hope that they were ready for Tanzania...and that it was ready for them.

“Mick, it will be fine.” Saida had a sleepy Zahra on her hip. “My family has been warned that yours are...Donovans.” She herself had at least met Lorna and Siobhan in the DMA, when she went with Mick for some work function; she knew what they were in for. What had disturbed even her was that, though Zahra had the deep complexion of her mother’s family, her face was pure Donovan — right down to her vivid green eyes. Mick said she was what you got when you took a Donovan and cranked the melanin up. “And it is not like your family have no manners.”

He sighed. “No, you’re right. They always mean well, but that’s just the problem. Lorna’ll keep them in line if she can, but you haven’t seen all’v them in one place, Saida, and your mam’s...well, she’s traditional, if you take my meaning.”

His long-suffering wife rolled her eyes. “That is why they will be good for her. She is not enough aware of the world outside Moshi.”

 _I can’t exactly blame her,_ Mick thought. Moshi had been safe during the War — safe and crowded, which had given everyone living there more than enough to be getting on with. Quite a lot of Norway had been evacuated into Tanzania, and while the majority of both peoples had English as a second language, individual proficiency varied, to put  it mildly. The goings-on of the world outside had been of secondary importance, and to many older Tanzanians, they still were. “I just wish we didn't have to put them up in the hotel, but there’s too bloody many’v them.” It wasn't just his siblings — they had their kids, and Siobhan had her grandkids along for the ride. Katje and Gerald were going on to some fancy resort at the coast, because they hadn't had a holiday...ever, as far as he knew.

“At least the hotel has been warned about them,” Saida said, even as she got Zahra settled in her high chair. “I only hope our house will not prove a disappointment.”

Mick glanced around. He knew a lot of people expected houses in Africa to be exotic in some way, but theirs, like many in Moshi, was a simple structure of wood and concrete that stayed blessedly cool on a hot summer day. Inside, it was like any other house that might be found in Ireland or America: a sitting-room with large east-and south-facing windows, a woodstove (winter nights could, after all, get chilly) and a dining room-kitchen combination.

The biggest difference, really, were the colors: the walls were a  sky blue, while the concrete floor was sunny gold known on the paint chip as ‘candleglow’. (Mick was still sadly aware of this for one excruciatingly embarrassing reason: that color had been meant to go on the walls, but like an eejit, he didn't check with Saida first and instead painted the floor. She’d laughed so hard she’d actually fallen over, and told him to leave it.)

“I’m sure they’ll be fine,” he said. “The couches are comfy and we’ve got plenty’v armchairs — that’s all that’ll matter. I hope.”

 

~

 

“This is a terrible idea.”

Lorna stared at their suitcases, packed neatly on the bed. Everything was in order; they were good to go for a fortnight’s holiday with Mick’s family, and she was dreading it. She’d _been_ dreading it for the last month, and looking at their cases (which were such a hideous pattern of pink-and-black tartan they were impossible to lose) made it all too real.

Ratiri kissed the crown of her head. “Mo chroí, you have to leave the mountain someday. It’s been three years.”

“I’ve left the mountain,” she protested.

“Going to the DMA doesn’t count. It’s far past time we saw Mick in his own home.”

She sighed. “I know, but you know me — I don't want to be recognized.” The events of the War had spread her face far and wide, and it was the main reason she almost never left the mountain. That was not a time in her life she cared to talk about, and it was all anyone was interested in. And even if she put her hair up, her height, or lack thereof, made her somewhat distinctive. The blind eye did not help.

“Mick knows that,” Ratiri said, “as does his wife's family. You have places to hide if you need to, but I know you’re as curious about Kilimanjaro as I am.”

He wasn't wrong. This early in the spring, plenty of snow lingered on their own mountain, but Mick said Moshi was quite pleasant — as were the lower slopes of Kilimanjaro. At forty-six, Lorna wasn't tempted to test herself against the whole thing, no matter how good a shape she was in, but she could enjoy the more reasonable altitudes.

And no matter how much she disliked it, Ratiri was right: she couldn’t hide forever. Not even to pet the tiny, big-eyed tortoiseshell cat that stared at her from atop her suitcase. “This’ll all end in  tears.”

“That’s the spirit,” her husband said. “Look at this way: they’re unlikely to be yours.”

 

~

 

Eris, being the most hypercompetent twenty-two-year-old to ever walk the face of the Earth, had bag packed, labeled, and stowed on a cart for herself, her mother, _and_ her toddlers. She’d taken over for Pat while she was at it, too. It left Mairead with just herself and her husband, to her visible disappointment.

There was actually a Door into Tanzania, but it let them out halfway between Singida and Arusha, and was a healthy distance from Moshi. It was a damn busy Door, too, because there was a lot of traffic between  Tanzania and Norway: quite a number of relationships, romantic and otherwise, had been formed during the latter’s evacuation.

Eris had been smart enough to rope the Donovans together via a string at the  wrist, so they wouldn’t get stepped on or separated in the crowd of so many people much taller than them. What with Ratiri the Giant to esseingally plow their way, they managed to avoid getting stuck.

Mick had warned them all to dress for warmer weather, which meant lots of shorts and T-shirts, though Siobhan had some long, handkerchief-hem concoction in brown and green, that made her stand out like the proverbial sore thumb. At least she would be easy to spot, even if her string broke.

Lorna had wrapped her braid around her head, and tied a dark green scarf over it, while pair of oversized, bug-eye sunglasses handily hid her blind eye. (Mostly blind; she’d swear she had a little more light perception now.) There was nothing she could do about the scar on her face,  but it wasn't glaring, and in any event she was far from the only person who had been scarred — literally — by the War. Add in some Bermuda shorts, nondescript brown vest top, and some sandals with a sole thick enough to boost her up an inch, and she ought to be able to blend just fine. Or so she thought, for about five minutes.

The problem — well, the first of  many problems — with the Donovan clan was their truly uncanny family resemblance. So far as coloring and facial features went, someone might as well have taken the clone stamp feature in Photoshop and gone to town with it, making only minor adjustments depending on gender. They were all varying levels of Shortarse, and while Lorna hid her eyes behind sunglasses, Saoirse and Eris both shared her green irises. In other words, they were a distinctive lot, and garnered quite a few double-takes as they shuffled out the Door,  squeaky cart in tow.

To a one, they blinked when they made it out into the bright sunlight. Much of Tanzania was eleven hours ahead of Washington, so they’d left at nine at night and now found themselves at eight in the morning.

“Is it still called jet lag if there’s no jet involved?” Saoirse asked, eying their surroundings with interest even as they (and their cart) shuffled off to the side of the terminal. There was no actual waiting-room here; they stepped out under a cloth shade, into air that was dry and pleasantly warm. This area had once been rural, but it definitely wasn't now: an entire town had sprung up around the door, with a motley patchwork of architecture that had distinct echoes of Norwegian design.

“Keep moving and you’ll stay awake,” Ratiri said. “Jet lag only really hits if you let yourself nap.”

A lanky young man with a bandana and a bad sunburn ooched over. “Hey, are you —”

“Nope,” Lorna said, as she gave his mind a very gentle push. Quite suddenly, he was thirsty enough to go in search of the nearest water-bottle. Maybe that was wrong of her, but she had absolutely no desire to talk to anyone who opened with the words, ‘hey, are you.’

Ratiri glanced down at his wife, and noted the tension in her posture. She all but migrated to the center of  their group, her grip on the band of her handbag so tight her knuckles were grey .

Saying anything would be unwise, but it was easy enough to unobtrusively pick at her aura as they filed their way out under the open sky. He was tall enough that he could easily spot Mick, in shorts, a T-shirt, and a rather ridiculous sun hat, lounging beside what looked like a school bus that was probably nearly as old as he was. It was so dented and dusty that its original color was something of a mystery; Ratiri would have hazarded olive green, if he absolutely had to. At least it was big enough that the seventeen of them and their luggage wouldn’t have to be wedged in like a game of Tetris, though air conditioning was probably too much to hope for.

Lorna brightened visibly when she found her little brother — and all the more so when they loaded their gear and boarded the bus. The seats were hard and threadbare, but it smelled surprisingly nice — cardamom, if she wasn't mistaken. “Have we really got half the hotel?”

“You do,” Mick said, right before he laid on the horn. “Nobody can fucking drive this close to the Door...it’s ridiculous. Anyway, you’ve got exactly half — it’s one that’s smaller and out’v the way. The sort that appeals to the kind’v travelers who actually want to see actual Moshi, and not something you could find all over the world.”

“There’s not spiders, are there?” Saoirse asked, saving Lorna the bother. “I mean, not big ones, right?”

“Not ones you’re likely to run into,” Mick said, which was probably not as helpful as he thought it was. “Moshi’s good about pest control.”

“God love you, Mick, but you’re shite at being reassuring,” Lorna said, though she laughed as she spoke. “If I get carried off by a spider in the night, I'm blaming you.”

Mairead and Jerry exchanged a glance. _They_ wouldn’t mind seeing a big spider, so long as it wasn't in their beds.

“There’s a reason I brought a boot,” Siobhan said.

Pat eyed her. “What, just one?”

“Don't leave it on the floor,” Ratiri said. He had never forgot the rather surreal phone call from Von Rached, early one morning in their Sydney hotel, warning him to check for spiders in his shoe. He’d had to look up a funnel-web spider later, and wished  he hadn't. Arachnids normally didn't bother him, but that thing had been...something else. To this day, he hadn't told Lorna just what sort of spider they’d been meant to look for.

Their ride was...interesting. What had once been a rural area was definitely rural no longer, and yet the natural beauty seemed to have been preserved where it could be. Carefully pruned trees that Mick called acacias shaded the road on either side — they looked like big umbrellas, with boughs that were surprisingly fir-like at a distance. Ratiri reflected that they were probably a bitch to clean up after, but they’d be a boon during a hot Tanzanian summer. The streets looked like they’d only been paved in the last year or so, but they were hazed with a transparent carpet of rust-hued dust, and they were clogged with cyclists and vans. There didn't seem to be any vehicles that weren’t vans or busses of some sort.

Lorna was just happy to be away from other humans, even if the bus’s interior wasn't exactly cool. Maybe that  wasn't healthy, but sue her. This was already beautiful country and she wanted to enjoy it on her own terms, before poor Saida’s family found itself inflicted with a case of Donovans. “You did warn Saida’s family about us, right?”

“Her whole family’s heard stories about us for years,” Mick said. “If they’re not ready, it’s not like they can say they weren't warned.”

“That’s oddly reassuring,” Siobhan mused.

“And if things do go tits-up,” Mick added, “it’s not like you haven’t got anywhere to go.”

 

~

 

The hotel, they found, was indeed a charming, old-fashioned place that seemed  homey and comfortable right off.

Lorna, Ratiri, and the twins had a double room with off-white walls and a curiously pattered, dark floor of some wood Lorna couldn’t identify. French doors looked out on a little lawn with a bench, shaded by a big green umbrella. A lot stone wall served as a fence.

No screen doors or windows, however — each bed had a canopy of white mosquito netting, which delighted the twins. Lorna just appreciated the fact that it was peaceful and quiet, and smelled of some sweet, nameless herb. It would make a good retreat, if — when — she had to.

A long dresser, seemingly made of  the same wood as the floor, dominated one wall. It had enough room for most of their clothes, at least, as well as a big lamp with a russet shade. She thoroughly inspected it for spiders before she let anyone put clothes in it, though.

“Oh thank God, a ceiling fan,” Ratiri said. The ceiling was low enough that he risked  whacking his head if he wasn't careful.

“I could get used to this place,” Lorna said. “Even if I haven't seen the bathroom yet.” Maybe this holiday wasn't such a bad idea after all. She was officially cautiously optimistic.

 

~

 

Luxury resorts in the original sense of the term were things of the pre-War past, but plenty of comfort and relaxation could still be had.

Katje and Gerald had never been on a proper holiday, so this was a nice change. They lounged on deckchairs beneath the warm sun, while four-year-old Miranda splashed in the hotel pool, carefully monitored by a lifeguard.

“Do you think they will be able to handle it, back home?” Katje asked. Her pale skin glistened with sunscreen, and yet she knew she’d get burned anyway.

“They’ll be fine,” Gerald said. “Anyone Julifer can’t browbeat into submission will just get cussed at by Geezer. Anyone who gets past _him_ will be faced with Gavin, and will probably run away.” Poor Gavin was nearly six and a half feet of muscled ex-gang leader who tended to intimidate people whether he wanted to or not. There were way too many people who assumed black men were all automatically dangerous, too — even Gerald, gentle nerd though he was, drew his fair share of nervous glances.

Gavin’s physique could make it ten times worse, but he had Geezer — and Geezer’s foul mouth — as backup. The old man could out-swear _Lorna_ , which was a rather impressive feat. “Just relax and enjoy the sun.” They would be here for a week, and he meant to enjoy it by doing nothing. As much nothing as he possibly could. If anything went wrong in their absence, he damn well didn't want to know about it.

 

~

 

“This ain’t gonna end well.”

Katje’s office wasn't big enough for four people — especially when one of those people was Gavin. They’d instead appropriated one of the smaller meeting-rooms, which smelled of sweet donuts and twice-brewed coffee (it was a luxury item, so the grounds were often brewed twice. The result was weak, but better than nothing.

“It’ll be all right,” Julifer said, as she stared at the not-so-tidy stack of reports. “I did this for Miranda, when she was busy.”

Geezer didn't bother pointing out that the DMA had been a fraction of its current size, and hadn't had any contact with the outside world. Even he knew how unhelpful that would be.

“I guess we just start,” Gavin said, “and keep our fingers crossed until they get home.” If something did go to hell, he absolutely did not want to have to call Katje and Gerald home early. They’d more than earned their vacation.

 

~

 

“Oh, why did I think this was a good idea?”

Saida’s mother fluttered around the back garden, inspecting the tables yet again — they were laid out with the Marwas’ best dishes, and many more borrowed from neighbors. Small potted violets, bought that morning, served as decoration; a big canvas awning, specially rented, provided shade. What little lawn they had was freshly cut, and smelled sweet in the morning air. “Two of these people are _famous_ , and this is my house they will see?”

Saida sighed. “Mama, I told you — the fastest way to get Lorna to run is to treat her like someone famous. She hates it. Mick had to do a lot of bargaining to get her to come to Tanzania in the first place. She and Ratiri are just...people.”

Her mother paused. “They are the woman who saved the world, and a respected ambassador, and you want me to just treat them like the neighbors?”

Saida couldn’t help but roll her eyes. “Lorna trains telepaths and works on the mountain, Mama,” she said. “Ratiri is a doctor on the mountain’s clinic. That is who they _are_ , not what they _were_. Please don't make Lorna run away.”

“It doesn’t seem right,” her mother said,even as she straightened the tablecloth.

“Right or not, it’s what they prefer. Promise me, Mama. Mick will be so disappointed if this is over before it even begins.”

“Oh, all right. But it still seems wrong.”

 

~

  


Before the War, Moshi had a population of about five thousand. It now had about that number plus half, with many a Norwegian — often accompanied by a small, visibly mixed-race child. Ratiri found it quite heartening that love had been at work even during the War.

He’d known there was a sizeable Indian population in Tanzania, too, though he hadn't known there were so many in Moshi. The War had apparently shifted around a lot of Tanzania’s own residents, too.It meant he didn't stand out _quite_ as much as he’d eared, when Mick took them on a tour.

There were still af air number of open-air markets, selling everything from vegetables to cheese to goats-milk soap. Colorful peppers he couldn't hope to name hung dried on strings, looped like garland below awnings.

“Da, I don't know what that meat is, but I want it.” Saoirse had all but dragged her father over to a stall selling various forms of kebab, that did indeed smell delicious.

“Allanah, you just had breakfast a few hours ago,” Pat protested, “and we’ve got lunch with Saida’s family in an hour and a half. You don't want to be full for that.”

 _“We can split it with her, Uncle Pat,”_ Jerry said, eying the kebabs. They’d had something like them back home, but these were _foreign_ kebabs, and so vastly superior.

Pat threw up his hands, defeated, and let Mick sort out the payment. It was bloody nice here, though; nobody seemed to be in any sort of hurry. Mick had said that punctuality wasn't exactly a concern in Tanzania, so there was no need to rush to get anywhere. Clothing ended toward simple, practical, and at least somewhat colorful, but none of the Donovans were going to stand out too much — not even Siobhan. Only Eris’s purple hair might cause any double-takes.

Yeah he could see why Mick had wanted to settle here. It was lively, but a steady, peaceful sort of liveliness, and totally unlike their childhood.

There weren't many vehicles here, either, but a battered bus tooled down the street, stuffed to the gills.

“Tourists,” the kebab-seller said. His age was hard to guess; he could have been anywhere from thirty to fifty. “Mountain-climbers. I am surprised, after everything, that people still go test themselves on the mountain.”

“I think some people have just got to,” Pat mused. “Not something I understand, myself. Have you lot gone back to money entirely? How do the tourists pay you?”

The man shook his head. “We trade,” he said, “or pay in tokens. People who come pay in some kind of work from their Gift, if it is of any use. It is why we have never starved.”

“Well, hell,” Pat said, “I’m a chloropath myself. My sister’s a healer, and her daughter’s got transmutation. You don’t want this one here doing anything, though,” he added, ruffling his daughter’s hair. “She’d just cause a flood.”

“Thanks, _Da_ ,” Saoirse grumbled, and rolled her eyes. At least the kebab kept her from saying anything more.

“Doctor Donovan knows where to send you, if you want to help.” The man looked immensely pleased Pat would even offer.

“For fuck’s sake, Omari, how many times have I got to tell you to just call me Mick?” The Mick in question had appeared seemingly out of nowhere, with a small basket of mangoes in one arm.

“I will stop calling you a doctor when you stop being one,” Omari said serenely. “Kebab?”

“As if I’d say no to that,” Mick grumbled. “You lot, don't tell Saida or her mam, or I’ll never hear the end’v it.”

 _“’Kay,”_ the twins chorused. The advantage of telepathy was that you never had to worry about talking with your mouth full.

 

~

 

Lorna was actually managing to relax a little. Mick had told her Tanzania hadn't paid much attention to the world outside, during the War or after, and it seemed he was telling the truth. She and her family could wander unnoticed, or as close to unnoticed as a group of people who looked so similar was ever going to manage. Tall, ginger Mairead was the one who really stuck out, even amidst a relatively multi-racial area, if only because her hair was distinctive just about anywhere. The poor woman got most of the attention, which left Lorna able to peruse the stalls in peace.

She hadn't really paid attention to how the economy was working in the outside world, now that money was a bit redundant — it was all too easy to counterfeit, but there was no point in it anyway. Anyone with transmutation could create clothes or dishes or all sorts of simple things, and chloropaths meant small farmers could once again support themselves. Things muddled along somehow, but on the mountain, she was shielded from it. She was shielded from many things, and for the first time, she thought that was not necessarily a good thing.

Her thoughts were interrupted by an elderly woman selling fruit. “Try a pear,” she said. “I picked them this morning.”

“I don't know how to pay,” Lorna said, suddenly flustered.

“I know your brother,” the woman said. “Do not worry about it. He takes care of my aura, which takes care of my arthritis.”

Lorna couldn’t help but smile. Mick’s Gift had hit him like a baseball bat, and at least it was something a doctor might actually want. “I can’t remember the last time I had a pear,” she said. She took the one the old lady offered — in her right hand, because Mick had said food and left hands, among other things, were a no-no in Tanzania. It meant she’d had to practice doing a whole load of things with her right hand that she normally automatically did with her left, but at least she hadn't fucked it up right out of the gate. Fortunately, Mick had also taught them a few basic Swahili words. “Asante.”

The old woman’s face split into a thousand wrinkles of delight as she smiled. “Mick did not leave you to flounder.”

“I think he taught us more than we’ll actually remember,” Lorna said. “At least we can say we tried.”

“Aunt Lorna,” Saoirse called, “the man who makes kebabs says some guy got eaten by a lion on the mountain during the War. Can we go see a lion? Da says no, but Da’s no fun.”

Lorna’s eyebrows rose. “I think I’m with your da,” she said. “The cats we’ve got at home are big enough for me.”

“Aunt Sharley would go,” Saoirse grumbled.

“Aunt Sharley,” Lorna said, “can’t get eaten by anything. Go make sure your cousins aren’t terrorizing anyone.”

The girl went, still grumbling.

“Puberty’ll be a joy with that one,” Lorna sighed. Pat kept meaning to build his own house, and she hoped he got it out of the way before PMS became a feature of Saoirse’s life.

“It always is. Enjoy your pear.”

Lorna eyed it, uncertain how she was meant to even bite it. “I need a picture’v it first. And maybe a chainsaw.”

Pear in hand, she perused a stall of spices. The mingled scent of it contents just  made her sneeze, and she fumbled for some tissues as the tour bus passed the other way, now carrying a few extremely sour-faced people.

“What crawled up their arses and died?” she asked, of no one in particular.

The old woman who ran the little stall snorted. “Either they did not read the website, or they thought it did not apply to them,” she said. “People with certain Gifts — telepathy, terrakinesis, and weather manipulation — are not allowed to climb to the summit. They found the hard way that altitude sickness can make a person lose control of their Gift, so Gifts that are dangerous can’t go so high. It is very clear on the website, but still people try.”

That made an unfortunate amount of sense. Not every country mandated that someone list their Gift on their official ID, either, so people probably thought they could sneak on through. “Has anyone managed to get up there anyway?”

“Twice, that we know of,” the woman said, shaking her head. “One telepath filled most of his group’s minds with hallucinations that made three fall off a cliff, and a weather-manipulator caused a tornado.” She snorted again. “The mountain is a place of many weathers, but tornadoes are not among them.”

If that happened on Kilimanjaro, Lorna didn't want to know what Everest was like. It added an extra element of uncertainty, which a certain type of person thrived on...right up until it killed them. “Oh, good Jesus. Well, there’s my excuse for not trying.”

 

~

 

When Mick went to check in with Saida at her parents’ house, his stomach dropped at the sight of the back garden.

“I thought it was just your parents and your siblings,” he whispered. The lot of them could easily have fit at one long table, and yet there were _four_ of the bloody things.

“It _was_ ,” she whispered back. “Either my mother or my sisters didn't understand that, and they told half the family, and half of that half don't have the sense not to go where they were not invited.” She’d watched with horror as the other tables were brought in, one by one, unable to think of what to say to her mother. This was not at all in the plans.

Mick groaned. “I hope they’re ready for Lorna to duck out early,” he said. And by ‘early’ he meant ‘possibly immediately’. “Jesus, this is just what I promised her wouldn’t happen.”

“You will warn her, won’t you?” Saida asked, her eyes tight with anxiety.

He blew out a long breath. “Haven’t got much choice, have I? I can’t just let her walk into this totally unprepared. Even as it is, she’ll murder me.” Saida’s family were warm, kind, and social, but there were one hell of a lot of them, and they didn't always have what the Irish would think of as tact. Family members, especially female family members, could be downright intrusive — and Lorna, though they’d never met her before, was family. He’d have to try to warn them, too, because the second someone asked her about Thorvald or anything to do with him, it would be over before it began.

Mick wondered if she would hate her form of celebrity nearly so much if Thorvald wasn't the only thing anyone ever wanted to talk about. He suspected that Ratiri handled it better because those who recognized him asked him about all sorts of things, but with poor Lorna it was always Thorvald, Thorvald, _Thorvald_. Even Mick didn't know just how that had gone down, but he did know that killing the bastard had been traumatic for her.

Maybe this really _was_ a bad idea.

 

~

 

For once, talking the children into nicer clothes wasn't a giant chore, because ‘nicer’ just meant ‘new shorts and vest tops’. For people who spent most of their time on a temperate mountain, the afternoon was too hot for anything else.

Lorna donned the dress she’d bought years ago in Sydney, the brown-and-green tie-dye, and left the scarf off her head so that her scalp wouldn’t sweat to death. The sunglasses stayed, however, and she had Ratiri to distract everyone — put him in a shirt that was even remotely form-fitting and he was instant eye candy, whether he liked it or not.

“I feel a bit foolish,” he said.

“It’s for a good cause,” she said, patting his arm. “It’s Tanzania — these ladies won’t try to get up close and personal. Mick said the etiquette rules between men and women are still pretty stiff. If they ogle, they won’t be open about it.”

The twins noses wrinkled in unison, because they knew the word ‘ogle’, which was gross enough even before it was applied to their _da_.

“Oi, just wait, the pair’v you,” Lorna said, giving their hair one last going-over. “Give it ten years and ogling might not seem so nasty. Now remember, right hands only.”

 _“Why, Mam?”_ Jerry asked. _“Uncle Mick said nobody uses their left hand because ages and ages ago, it was how you wiped your arse after you’d been to the toilet, but toilet paper got invented and nobody does that anymore.”_

“Sometimes, if something’s done long enough, it sticks forever,” Lorna said. “Nothing wrong with that. And no saying ‘arse’ in front’v Saida’s family. I don't care if your uncle’s told them all about us — we don't need to be so obviously Donovans right out’v the gate.”

The twins exchanged a glance. Sometimes, grown-ups really didn't make any sense. Either way, they’d agreed to keep an eye on Aunt Eris’s twins; Sam and Donna were four and a half, and so curious they’d get underfoot before the average grown-up even knew they were there.

The room’s phone rang while Ratiri was gathering all their assorted gear (mobiles, tissues, Lorna’s spare nicotine patches). When the latter answered it, she paled — indeed, she paled so much that he worried she might fall over.

“Oh really?” she asked, in a tone so neutral he winced. She only sounded like that when she was desperately trying to keep a lid on her temper. “Okay. No, that’s okay. I just won’t be long. Seriously, Mick, it’s okay — we’ll see you there.” She paused. “It’s okay, Mick. See you soon. Bye.”

“Mo chroí?” Ratiri asked, when she hung up.

“Christ, I want an actual cigarette,” she grumbled. “Half’v Saida’s extended family’s invited themselves to this, and Tanzanian families being what they are, her parents can’t exactly tell them to fuck off. This’ll be a clutersfuck and a half, but I can deal with it for a bit — especially if there’s booze.”

Ratiri tried not to wince. Psychiatric medication was still in short supply, so Lorna refused anything but the occasional Xanax...which she generally didn't need at home, because she never left the mountain. She only ever popped part of one if she had a nightmare. “Why don't you try the Xanax instead,” he said.  “You don’t know what sort of alcohol they have here, and you know Gerald would give you the sad face if he found out you were drinking instead of actually taking your meds.”

Her nose wrinkled. “God, he would, wouldn’t he? I don't know when the man discovered he could look like a kicked puppy...fine, but just a little bit’v one. I don’t like it. I’d rather feel drunk than that weird...numbness.”

“That’s why it’ll just be a bit,” he said. They had a pill cutter and everything; it was the work of a moment to shave a sliver off one of the little blue pills. “Here, take it with some fizzy drink, so it doesn’t taste revolting.” They’d picked up a six-pack of some local, Fanta-like brew at the market, with a distinctive hint of pear.

The pill was bitter anyway, and Lorna drank half the bottle to wash it away. Of course she belched so loudly it echoed, and passed the bottle to the twins, so they could finish it off. “See, if Saida’s family was Irish, she could just tell them to piss off.”

“Deep breath, mo chroí,” Ratiri said. He gave her shoulders a mini-rub for good measure, and devoutly hoped this wasn't _actually_ going to turn into a clusterfuck.

Before he could worry any further, a freshly-shaved Pat turned up on their doorstep, Saoirse in tow. The girl had her backpack, which meant she had her art supplies, too; no doubt she’d get a least one memorable image out of the evening.

 _“Mam’s on drugs,”_ Jerry said, by way of greeting.

“She’s taken part of a Xanax,” Ratiri said, unable to avoid an eyeroll. “Stick with her, will you?”

Lorna sighed, even as she hunted down her sandals. “I’m not made’v glass, you lot.”

Ratiri’s warm, comforting hand ran over her back. “No, mo chroí, but PTSD isn’t something to be ignored. Just let us hover and we’ll feel better, too.”

“You,” she said, “are lucky I love you.”

 

~

 

Siobhan had more than a few things to say when she found out about the Marwa Family Clusterfuck-In-Waiting, but at least Pat kept her from actually saying them to Mick.

“It’s not his fault,” he said, even as he kept little Sam from chasing some unknown bug in the garden. “It’s not Saida’s fault. Whoever’s to blame is whatever eejit blabbed it to God and everyone, but it’s Tanzania and they’ve just got to run with shite like this. Lorna’s had part’v a Xanax, and you know how distracting we all are in a group anyway. Just stick together and act vaguely creepy and we’ll be golden. If Mick really has told them about us, they’ll just roll with it.”

“Christ, I hope you’re right,” Siobhan sighed.

The lot of them went out into the sunset, merging into a vague Donovan blob, with poor Mairead once again the most visible outlier. A sun hat, bought at the market, had kept her face from burning, but in spite of sunscreen, her arms and legs were already red. “I’ll be peeling like a snake by the time we go home,” was her only comment on that.

It was a bit of a walk to the Marwa home, but not so much of one that they needed Mick’s bus. Sam and Donna were too young for it, but Ratiri and Eris each carried one like a monkey. The heat of the day, such as it had been, had passed, and a light breeze kept things comfortable even by the standards of the mountain-dwellers.

The Xanax kicked in as they walked, and a much calmer Lorna looped her arm through Ratiri’s. This would, she reminded herself, make Mick happy, and Tanzanians were not exactly known to be rude people. They’d muddle through. Her only worry was that she wouldn't be able to get anybody’s name right after only one introduction, but that was a generalized Donovan issue, and if Mick had any sense, the Marwas would already know about it.


	2. Chapter Two

When the doorbell rang, Mick scrambled to answer it. As soon as he’d gone, Saida faced her family.

Given that she was at least somewhat younger than many of them, she really shouldn’t be laying down the law like this, but they’d left her with little choice. “All right,” she said, with what was not quite a glare, “I mean it. Do not ask Lorna about the War, and if you must ask Ratiri, there must be no questions about the violence he saw there. The two of them were invited with the understanding that this would be a relaxing holiday, not an interrogation by people they do not know.”

Some of her elder aunts looked quite displeased, and her cousins disappointed, but on this she would not budge.

“No Thorvald?” one cousin asked. Emmanuel was only twenty, and remained unhappy he’d been too young to take part in the War in any sense. His curiosity about it was endless.

“ _Absolutely_ no Thorvald,” Saida said. “I know you all know what PTSD is. Respect Lorna’s. If you are too disappointed, you do not need to stay.” She might not actually be able to say _you weren’t invited anyway,_ but it was heavily implied. Her aunts could complain about her to her mother later; she hardly cared. After the War, family disapproval no longer carried the weight it once did. Quite a few things didn't.

There was some grumbling, but general assent. Nevertheless, she’d have to keep an eye on everyone; while she couldn't go off on her family with impunity, the Donovans were protective, profane, and not above offending...everyone. Looking at her family — especially certain aunts — made her think that perhaps some of them _needed_ offending, but it would only upset Mick and Lorna in the process.

“Oh,” she added, “and if she’s wearing sunglasses, don't comment. If she is not, do not stare at her scar or her eye.” The scar, from what Saida had seen, wasn't actually that noticeable (unless a person stared), but there was no disguising the eye. Hence, sunglasses.

Mick led the entire knot of Donovans out into the sweet evening air, and even the bluntest, most practical members of Saida’s family paused. There really was something unsettling about seeing so many of them in a group — especially Lorna, Siobhan, and Eris. Even with the difference in their hair and very slight variance in height, they could have been clones of varying ages. There was also no way that the similarity of Lorna and Siobhan’s dresses wasn't calculated.

The effect was even worse with the two sets of twins, with their pale telepath eyes: it was rather like an olive-skinned, black-haired version of the children from _Village of the Damned_.

Well. Saida’s busybody family might not know what had hit it — their unwelcome curiosity might just bite them in the arse.

Good.

Lorna did in fact have her sunglasses, but they were only lightly tinted — enough to somewhat screen the blind eye that so unsettled people. She could meet the gaze of all she was introduced to, since that was apparently counted as an important thing in Tanzanian culture. It was with some relief that she noticed a number of the older women weren’t actually much taller than she was.

Ratiri, naturally, towered over everyone, but that was only to be expected. He collected a glass of some cool, fruity punch (that seemed to have mango as a prime ingredient), and resigned himself to being decorative. To his mind, it was highly silly that a man of his age should _be_ considered decorative, and he couldn't say he was comfortable with it, but it had its occasional uses. If he could draw attention away from his even more uncomfortable wife, he could deal with it.

Lorna hid it well enough, however, at least for now. Xanax was a great thing, in moderation; she managed to look relaxed, holding her own glass of punch while she was swarmed by a few of Saida’s female relatives. It probably helped that she had Siobhan with her, looking creepily identical.

They were introduced to these women in such rapid succession that Lorna didn't have a hope in hell of remembering which name belonged to who (though she was quite surprised to find one of them was called ‘Winifred’, which she’d always associated with old, white, fussy English women).

“All right, I have to ask you this, even though I think Saida would slap me,” the Winifred in question said. Her age was tough to guess, but Lorna would peg her at early twenties at the very oldest. The young woman’s voice dropped almost to a whisper when she said, “Your husband is so tall, and you are so little. How do you manage, in the bedroom?”

The other women stared at her, scandalized, but Lorna laughed so hard she nearly choked. She’d been asked that question a fair few times over the years, and she’d much rather it than anything to do with Thorvald. “Creatively,” she said, utterly deadpan. “He’s a doctor. He’s good at geometry, and I’m still pretty flexible.”

The lot of them must have been relieved she hadn't taken offense, because they burst into distinctly relieved giggles. “Did you have giant babies?” Winifred asked.

Lorna groaned. “Christ, did I ever — you’d not guess it, given how little they are now, but it was a bloody nightmare, and I blame Ratiri. Siobhan here, her daughter was a tiny little thing.”

“And she’s shorter than you,” Siobhan added. “Somehow.”

“You two — you are not twins?” another, slightly older woman asked — she had on some kind of scarf/hat/turban of a deep red striped with gold, that folded into a sort of flower shape behind her right ear. Lorna had no idea how it worked, and figured it would be rude to just stare at it.

“No, we’re just Donovans,” Siobhan said. “We’re all like this — if anybody knows why, it’s not us. Mairead over there’s the outlier, but she hasn’t got the same da as us.”

Lorna tried not to breathe a sigh of relief. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all, but she wasn't about to tempt Fate by saying so, even to herself.

 

~

 

Pat was having a surprisingly easy time of it. The men of Saida’s family had evidently set out to get him very slowly drunk, but he was a Donovan, so it was a losing proposition from the get-go. Mairead had once told him that the Donovans had the alcohol tolerance Time forgot, whatever the hell that was even meant to mean.

In fairness, they’d at least had him eat some form of sweet bread first, but the kick of whatever he’d been given told him that wouldn’t do an ordinary person much good. “Have you ever tried this on Mick?” he asked. Jesus, this stuff had the kick of gin, times ten, and a vaguely sweet flavor.

“Yes,” one middle-aged cousin — Manue was probably his name, if Pat had it right — said. “It did not work. Why did it not work?”

“Hell if I know,” Pat said, and took another swig. “Our da was a drunk, but it’s bloody hard to get any’v us off our faces.”

The slightly blank looks he received told him that his accent was coming on a bit too thick, so he tried that again, a bit more clearly. “Jesus, if you think I'm bad, get Lorna going,” he added. “Set her off and you’d never know she was speaking English — but don't go handing her anything right now,” he added. “She’s taking a medication, and she can’t have alcohol while she’s on it. Try Shiv, she’d probably be game.”

This drink really was quite nice — it left him feeling warm, but not overly so. What it _didn't_ do was impair his balance, so his fuzzy brain couldn’t process just why the ground suddenly sent him wobbling.

Manue caught his arm before he could stumble too much. “Earthquake,” he said. “Small ones happen. Usually it is when new terrakinetic is born — there are a lot of them lately. Does anyone know why that happens? Why there are a lot of people born with one Gift at once?”

“I don't think so. If they do, they’ve not told anyone else,” Pat said. Though this drink wasn't fizzy, it made him belch anyway.

“Oi, Pat, _already_?” Siobhan called. “Jesus, can you not at least wait until after we’ve actually eaten? I wish I could say he’s not always like this, but I can’t.”

“In case Mick didn't warn you, our family’s a bit...different,” Lorna said. “He got raised by sane people after our mam died. The rest’v us...didn't.”

“Are the stories he tells about your family actually true?” Winifred asked. “Some of them we think he must be making up.”

“According to him, he hasn’t actually told you the worst’v them,” Siobhan said. “If there even is one single ‘worst’.”

“I think the most destructive was what we did to the headmistress’s car when I was eleven,” Lorna mused. “Though in fairness, it went a bit wonky from the start. So, fireworks are illegal in Ireland, but Pat had got hold’v some from Christ only knows where.

“Well, our headmistress was a battle-axe who hated the lot’v us, which we normally wouldn’t’ve given even half a shit about, but she made Mick cry.”

“Which was the only real no-no we had,” Siobhan added.

“See, Mick’s the youngest’v us by a fair few years, and we were protective’v him,when we weren’t wrapping him in a blanket burrito because he was being a pest,” Lorna went on. “Nobody made him cry and got away with it, but we could hardly just punch an adult, so instead we went out at midnight, took four strings’v whatever hell that firework was called, and just sort’v festooned them around her car before we lit them off.

“Well, what none’v us knew was that her car was actually in kind’v shite repair, leaking oil and antifreeze and even transmission fluid, for all I know. Either way, what happened was that something in her petrol tank must’ve been banjaxed, because the entire bloody car exploded — fireball, just like you see in movies. I just about pissed myself, but we all had the sense to run the fuck up and crawl back into our rooms before anyone could know we were gone.”

“She spent the next four months riding the bus,” Siobhan said smugly, “because apparently her insurance didn't want to give her anything. We weren't stupid enough to let on that it was us that’d done it, and she wasn't exactly short’v enemies, but she had to know that we were the only ones that’d actually do something like that. She couldn't prove it, though — but she was smart enough to never give Mick any shit again. Nobody ever took care’v us Donovans, but we damn well took care’v each other.”

The gaggle of cousins stared at them. “We thought Mick was joking,” turban women — Mariam, if Lorna had it right — said.

“Not hardly,” Lorna snorted. “Poor Mick just got dragged along for the ride more often than not, but if he’s told you a story, it’s not just true, it’s probably downplayed.”

“What’s downplayed?” The Mick himself appeared, with a glass of beer and a distinctly relieved impression.

“Anything you told this lot about our childhood,” Siobhan said. “They didn't know about Twatwaffle’s car, for one thing.”

Mariam choked on her punch; she at least must have recognized the word ‘twat’, if nothing else. “You called your headmistress this?”

“Well, not to her face,” Siobhan said.

Saoirse, who had heard about this woman, called, “Da says Aunt Lorna did.” She’d found an out-of-the-way corner, and was already sketching.

“I might’ve done,” Lorna said. “Once or twice.”

“Or four times, knowing you,” her sister said. “This one never did know when to quit.”

“Eh, it is likely why you are still alive,” one elder aunt said. “Only the stubborn survive, in something like the War.”

Lorna was on such a pleasant Xanax cruise that she said, “Oh, I didn't survive. I died, and I got sent back. And before you ask why, I’m not sure myself. Christ, I want a beer.”

“Uimh,” Siobhan said. “Níor dó druga.” _No. Not with your medicine._

It took all Lorna’s willpower not to roll her eyes. “Tú,” she said, “tá uimh craic.” _You are no fun._

Mick eyed the pair of them. “Cad druga?” _What medicine?_

“Ní anois,” Siobhan said firmly. _Not now._

The assorted Marwas had heard Mick mutter in Irish often enough to recognize the language, though none of them were about to pry.

“What was that like?” Mariam asked. “Dying?”

“Weird, and I’m not sure I'm meant to talk about it,” Lorna said. “I just know I came back with scrambled eggs for brains. Kept literally forgetting my own name.”

“You survived all that time with Von Rached,” the aunt said, “and somehow did not kill him. We saw him on television, when he was with the United Nations. I could see how much you wanted to slap him.”

Lorna blinked, because she’d had no idea that clusterfuck had been televised. “Believe me, that wasn't the only time. I know he looked like this intimidating giant, but in reality he was just a twat.”

 _“He didn't know how to do like, anything,”_ Jerry added, and scared half the life out of just about everyone. How long had he been lurking under the table? _“I mean, he could do science stuff, and he could cook, but he had to look up what to do for Christmas out of a book.”_

 _“Yeah, and the whole reason he kidnapped us was because he totally wasn't paying attention to...anything, really,”_ Mairead added, from beside her brother. _“He thought we were the only telepathic kids in the whole world. I mean, he never actually_ told _us that, but we broke into his desk and went through all his stuff. He was such a shut-in that he had no idea telepathy was actually super common.”_

That just made Lorna blink again, because it was the first time she’d heard any of that. The fact that he’d been so ridiculously blind was oddly pleasant, and made her dissolve into giggling before she could help it. Seriously, what a bloody eejit… “Jesus, I wish I'd known that. I’d never’ve let him live it down.”

 _“He never did tell us what he did to you and Da, though,”_ Jerry added. _“Just that it was bad.”_

Lorna froze, but only momentarily. “It was,” she said, “and you’re too bloody young to know. Your da’s scars didn't come from nowhere.” The marks on Ratiri’s wrists were much faded, but they were still there — and Lorna herself had borne the physical consequences of her time there and afterward until she met Jary, who healed them (but had no choice but to leave her with her new set of scars, and that lovely eye).”

The twins glanced at one another, because they honestly had a hard time imagining Doctor Man doing stuff like that. Sure, he was super creepy, but they’d never seen him even come close to actually _hurting_ anyone.

“That’s enough about him, though,” Mam said. “I’d rather not get put off my dinner before it’s even started.”

 

~

 

Geezer was too damn old for this bullshit.

He’d been Miranda’s second, and later Katje’s, but that had been during times of pretty massive upheaval. Bureaucracy had taken a backseat to genuine, immediate need, but that was definitely not the case now. _Now_ they were stuck dealing with hundreds of pencil-pushers, and thousands of documents and spreadsheets about things he neither knew about nor cared to.

“How the hell does Katje _do_ this?” he asked, even as he tossed a slightly dog-eared paper onto the desk. “I get that she delegates half this shit, but why does she look at the complaints? Ninety-eight percent of these are such bullshit that it’s an insult to the paper they’re printed on. Have people already forgotten what _real_ problems look like?”

“Pretty much,” Gavin said. He was sorting papers into various trays with a speed that spoke of way too much practice. “You’d be amazed at some of the shit that comes through.”

“Yeah, there will probably still be petty assholes right up until the end of the Universe,” Julifer added. “Katje looks at them once and then chucks most of them — the only ones that don't go in the circular file are the ones that’re actually legit.”

“Yeah, well, so far that’s about three outta the twenty-eight I’ve looked at.” Geezer shook his head. He’d hoped the office, business crap had died with the old world, but apparently not. He wanted to know who’d been so determined to restart it, just so he could hunt them down and punch them until they stopped moving. Was this shit really why they’d put civilization back together? This same time-wasting nonsense? “You know what? Fuck this.”

Both Julifer and Gavin eyed him warily. The former had known him much longer than the latter, but Gavin still knew to be cautious of that tone. “Geezer, man, we’ve only got to hang on for a week,” he said. “You don't need to go rewriting shit that’ll just give Katje a headache when she gets home.”

“I won’t have to,” Geezer said, drumming his fingers on the messy stack of papers. “Just a few times of this and everybody’ll think twice before they submit stupid bullshit. I say we send people out to investigate some of this dumber shit — lots of people, to go over it in minute detail and totally derail the day of everybody who was asshole enough to badger us with it in the first place.”

“As satisfyingly evil as that sounds,” Julifer said, “it’s a mess in the making.”

Geezer snorted. “Isn’t everything in this damn place? The pencil-pushers don't care how many other peoples’ days they wreck. This oughtta teach ’em.”

Julifer might have reservations, but at this point, Gavin would take anything that would get him out of this fucking chair. If Katje yelled at them when she got home, he could stand there and take it. “Let’s do it.”

“This isn’t going to end well,” Julifer warned.

“So long as they’re more annoyed than we are, I’ll call it a win,” Gavin said. “It’s not like anything else is gonna wreck their day.”

As if to prove him utterly wrong, the power unceremoniously failed. It plunged them briefly in total darkness, before the yellow emergency lights kicked on.

“Dammit, kid,” Geezer sighed. “You had to fucking jinx us, didn't you.”

 

~

 

Dinner was about to commence, and nobody was dead, maimed, or cursing, which Ratiri counted as a win. The males of the family were trying (and still failing) to get Pat drunk, and the women seemed so unnerved by Lorna and Siobhan’s childhood stories that insensitive questions had yet to be asked. Soon enough, everyone would be busy with food, which would hopefully prevent any future social blunders. Ratiri was being appropriately (if awkwardly) decorative, while Saida’s mother was giving Mairead and Kevin a thorough education on Tanzanian cuisine.

“So far, so good,” Mick said. He had some form of local beer called Raha, made from bananas; Ratiri had already had one, and found that it was a sweet drink that tasted rather more of pears than bananas. “You’re thinking about work, aren’t you?”

Ratiri couldn’t help but give him a slightly crooked smile. “Is it that obvious?” he asked. “I haven’t been away from the clinic for more than a few days in the last three years. I know they’ll be fine without me, but if I'm honest…” He sighed. “If I’m honest, I'm as dug-in as Lorna. The mountain’s...home. It’s safe. I know, broadly, what's going to happen from day to day. After all the uncertainty of the War, I’ve found there’s something to be said for stability, even if some might call it monotony.”

“Is that why you are no longer an ambassador?” Mariam asked.

Since there was no judgement in her dark eyes, Ratiri answered honestly. “It’s one reason,” he said. “Other reasons include that what works well in wartime isn’t so effective in a time of peace, and that I wanted as much of my life back as I could manage. I had a job, before everything went to hell. After the War ended, I was of more use there.”

What went unsaid — what didn't _need_ to be said — was his family was together again, in their home. He’d lost them all for far too long, and had come very close to losing Lorna permanently. Their no-longer-little house on the mountain was exactly where he wanted to be, and anything that wanted to pry him away for anything other than a holiday would have to tie him up and stuff him in a sack — and he was rather too tall to stuff into a sack.

“You have the PTSD too, don't you?” she asked.

“Who doesn’t, anymore?” Ratiri said. “I do. I have pills for when I need them, and I see a therapist. I’m lucky enough to have access to both.”

“In the last year we have too, for the most part,” she said. “There are a few plants now that make things like lithium. It is not perfect, but it is better than nothing.”

“Anything is almost always better than nothing,” Mick said.

A dinner-bell — an actual dinner-bell — rang before anyone could say more, and half the Marwas scurried off to the house.

Extra lanterns were brought out along with the food, which smelled so wonderful (and some of it vaguely familiar) that Ratiri found himself in danger of actually drooling. That big bowl of brown rice and spiced meat was, if he wasn't mistaken, pilau — his mother had made something similar when he was a child. A large, red ceramic plate held a stack of golden flatbread that looked much like the roti he sometimes made his own family. Aside from kebabs (which anyone would recognize, no matter what the meat), there were rather intriguing dishes that featured bananas, as well as a massive bowl of what looked like big balls of pale dough, surrounded by smaller bowls of assorted sauces.

“Good food, good meat, good God, let’s eat,” Saoirse said. If there was one thing that was all but guaranteed to get her to put away her art supplies, it was food. Ratiri just hoped she wouldn't make some innocently profane blunder in front of God and everybody.

Lorna elbowed him lightly in the ribs. _Focus_ , she said, with a little smile. _Get through dinner and they'll probably let you take photos later._ Since the War, the pair of them had taken up a joint hobby: photography and scrapbooking. Finding film wasn't exactly easy, but Katje always seemed to manage.

 _Yes, mo chroí._ He couldn't help a little smile of his own, because whatever else their holiday had in store, this moment was quite perfect. For now.

They’d got through most of the meal before another Saida’s cousins — whose name, of course, escaped Ratiri — piped up. “What was it really like, traveling with Von Rached?”

“More annoying than I’ve got words for,” Lorna said. “Seriously, the man was a mental cheese-grater on the best’v days, and he’s not something I'm particularly keen on talking about. He’s nobody’s problem now.”

Even in the low light, Ratiri could see Saida glaring daggers at her cousin; if looks could kill, the poor woman would be incinerated. She seemed young — early twenties at most — which might have explained her less-than-stellar-tact. Unfortunately, she didn't seem capable of leaving it there.

“It’s too bad he was an evil man,” she said, “because he seemed like an _intense_ one.”

 _Oh, bloody Jesus no…_ Lorna was mercifully unaware of the Von Rached groupies, but Ratiri had been unfortunate enough to discover their existence not quite a year ago. He probably shouldn’t have been surprised, given serial killers had had them for decades, but the fact that _Von Rached_ had some was enough to make any sane person’s skin crawl.

“He’s enough to put anyone off their dinner,” Siobhan said firmly, “and this food’s too good for that. Seriously, Mrs. Marwa, I'd love some recipes.”

The poor woman looked somewhat baffled by Siobhan’s vehemence, but ran with it anyway. “Of course.”

“This one’s a creative use of bananas,” Ratiri added, and gave her a winning smile. He always felt vaguely unclean when he had to act as a distraction this way, but it was hard to argue with the results. The woman looked incredibly pleased.

Lorna’s foot touched his. _I promise I’ll make this up to you when we get home, if we don't get some alone-time before then._ Her aura was...odd, and he wondered if they’d overdone the Xanax a bit. There was an awful lot of calm cerulean for a situation like this. Still, better that than the alternative.

“Doctor Creepy could cook,” Saoirse said, mainly addressing her bread. At least she wasn't talking with her mouth full. “I mean, he sucked at a lot’v other stuff, and he was, well, _creepy_ , but he made bomb hamburgers.”

Jerry, being far more socially adept, cut in before she could say more. _“He wasn't as good a cook as Da, though. The only person who can beat Da there is Aunt Mairead.”_

“When it comes to desserts, maybe,” his aunt said. “Otherwise, your da’s got me beat at a fair few things.” She was looking rather rosy in the face, and Ratiri wondered if she’d been at the alcohol that had spectacularly failed to inebriate Pat.

“What was it like, in the North?” Siobhan’s cousin asked, her eyes alight with curiosity.

Lorna blinked. “How the hell d’you know what it was called?” Her accent, rapidly thickening, rendered much of that gibberish, but the wretched cousin must have caught enough of it anyway.

“Haven’t you read the book?” she asked. “Some of the ones in the North wrote it. They talk of their time there, their jobs and why the were there — and what Von Rached was like.”

Saida said something very sharp in Swahili, and her cousin sank down in her chair.

“I don't get out much,” Lorna said. “No, I haven’t read it. I'd not heard it, and it’s bloody disturbing that it even exists. What was it like? It was barely bearable until Pat and Shiv and Saoirse showed up. It somehow managed to be tense and boring at the same time, which shouldn’t’ve been bloody possible. Why would anyone want to read about that? Why would anyone _care_? It’s been over and done with for three fucking years.”

She received such blank looks that Ratiri was forced to translate much of that, as tactfully as he could.

Fortunately, Saida rose, stalked over to her cousin, and all but dragged the hapless woman away, hissing in Swahili the entire time. Mick looked like he desperately wanted to follow, but didn't quite dare.

“Who would even write something like that?” Lorna wondered aloud. “Everyone who was in that place who wasn't an arsehole’s tried to pretend it never happened. They don't want their names associated with it, and no wonder.”

“Mo chroí, it’s probably fake,” Ratiri said. “Here, try this. If we can actually get bananas at home, we could make it ourselves.”

“They did not use their names,” young Emmanuel said. Evidently, he was as oblivious to the general mood of a situation as Saoirse. “It was all anonymous. It made them more honest, I think. I would not have thought most of them were not...evil.”

“Lad, few enough people really are,” Siobhan said. “But these bananas are more interesting. Dammit.”

“I do not know why someone would read such a book,” Saida’s father said, stabbing at his meat. “It is over. Why think about it?”

Lorna raised her glass in an impromptu toast. “Exactly. Here’s to our Von Arsewipe-free world.”

Her words were punctuated by a deep, distant rumbling. Ratiri had just enough time to wonder what the hell it was, before the earth jerked so violently that he was not the only one who fell right out of his chair — and nearly knocked the breath out of himself in the process. Dishes slid and slipped and tipped over the table’s edge, though most didn't break when they hit the lawn.

“Jesus _Christ_ !” That was a Donovan, though he couldn't tell which one; he was too busy snatching a twin under each arm. He knew, vaguely, that an earthquake was safest dealt with out in the open, so out they went, over the garden wall. Siobhan and Eris were right behind him, each holding one of the latter’s twins. Why was the ground _still shaking_? The last tremor hadn't lasted more than a few seconds, and Ratiri’s pulse only bounded faster with each passing moment. Where the hell was Lorna—

With an utter lack of warning, the power cut, and the street plunged into darkness. Someone shrieked, but at least a few of the lamps had been salvaged from the dinner-tables. Their golden glow was something to focus on, at least — and it lit up the silver of Lorna’s hair, as she and a silhouette that must have been Pat pelted toward him. Saoirse, cussing like a sailor, clung to her father’s back like a monkey.

The shuddering ground jerked sharply again. Though Ratiri staggered like a drunk, _somehow_ he kept his feet, but not everyone else did. A cacophony of swearing — in English, Irish, and what sounded like Swahili — rose into the warm night air, as loud as the earth’s rumbling.

Shit, how long had this gone on already? It felt like forever to Ratiri’s adrenaline-flooded mind, but he had the wits to sit, and do his best to shield the twins’ bodies with his own.

A small, warm hand clapped onto his shoulder — Lorna's hand. He pulled her in, too, while an irrational part of him became increasingly terrified that the ground would split and swallow them whole.

What seemed an interminable amount of time later, the shaking abruptly ceased. The jackhammering of Ratiri’s heart did not.

“Fucking Christ on a rollercoaster.” That had to be Pat, and an unsteady Pat at that. “Donovans, sound off.”

“Here,” Lorna and Siobhan called in unison.

“Here!” Mairead and Jerry added.

In the distance came a ‘here’ that could only be Eris, followed by, “Sam, you can’t eat that.”

“Fuck everything.” Yep, there was Mairead, and the general, masculine Irish cursing was probably Kevin.

“Mick, where are you? Mick?”

“Shut it, will you? Saida, are you out there?”

A groan answered him, followed by muttered Swahili. “Yes,” his wife said. “I have the children. We are all right.”

 _A load of other people won’t be,_ Ratiri thought. Apparently, he and Siobhan were destined for a Busman’s Holiday — he could only pray that there wouldn’t be more casualties than they could handle. It was still early enough that most people probably weren’t in bed.

 _Well, now I feel like shit._ Lorna’s thought was warm in his mind, with a faint, lingering  undercurrent of artificial serenity. _I was hoping for a distraction, but this wasn't what I had in mind. Allanah, after that, I won’t be able to sleep indoors. Christ in a sidecar, Mick’s never once mentioned anything like_ that _._

Ratiri stroked Jerry’s hair, though his son didn't seem frightened in the least — nor did his daughter, come to that. Their auras both flared with purple excitement. _It can’t be usual_ , he said. _He wouldn’t have kept it from us if it was._

 _“Holy hell, Da, that was an_ earthquake _,”_ Jerry said. _“A proper earthquake.”_

 _“You’re not gonna make us go home, are you?”_ Mairead added.

Ratiri glanced at Lorna. As much as he _wanted_ to do just that, it depended on how many people would need to go to the DMA for treatment. “No,” he said. “Not yet, but I want you to help your cousin keep an eye on Donna and Sam, all right? I know Eris will want to take them home, but she might need to wait.”

His children exchanged a glance that, even in the uneven lantern-light, looked disturbingly pleased. _That_ would have to be addressed later.

“What in mother fuck was that?” Pat demanded. His voice remained as wobbly as Ratiri felt.

“A woman in the market told me people certain Gifts aren't allowed to climb the mountain,” Lorna said. She sat as well, and pushed her sunglasses up onto her head — it was far too dark for them now. “Oxygen deprivation’s a bitch, apparently, but some terrakinetic might’ve made their way anyway. Fuckstick.” The alternative was that someone had done it on purpose, but Gifted terrorism was, given human nature, surprisingly rare — and, as Julifer put it, Tanzania was a pretty chill country. They’d recovered well after the War, without starvation or a whole lot of unrest.

“If that's the case, I'll hunt whoever it is down and fetch them a slap that’ll leave their ears ringing until next year,” Siobhan growled. “Twat. Is everybody all right?”

Given how many people were involved, that was not a question that could be answered right off. Eventual consensus, among both Donovans and Marwas, was that while there were a lot of bumps, skinned knees, and skinned palms, there was nothing worse. It was a mercy most of them had been outside.

“Well, fuck,” Saoirse said. “ _Now_ what?”


	3. Chapter Three

‘Now what’ turned out to be a gathering of the med people, trained, Gifted, or both. There were a smattering of healers in the area in addition to the actual medical personnel.

The Donovan Herd migrated to Moshi’s main hospital in Mick’s bus; thanks to their time aboard Jary’s airship, they all had experience in dealing with the aftermath of natural disasters. Even the twins and Saoirse were fairly phlegmatic about injuries, so long as no broken bones were sticking out.

The Duke Emergency Department was obviously a place that had been hastily expanded at some point during the War, and continued on from there. Judging by the speckled, greeny-grey floor tiles and concrete walls, Lorna would guess the oldest bits had been built in the 70’s. Much of the med center attached to it was probably about the same age, but growing out from it, like tentacles, were sections done in an entirely different style — the main buildings were sided in clean, simple white and cream wood, but the newer structures were a hodgepodge of cinderblocks, bricks, and even one that looked rather like an immense log cabin. She didn't want to think about how many trees must have been cut down to make it, since they had to have come from the forest on the lower slopes of Kilimanjaro.

She kept the twins out of the way while Mick, Ratiri, and Siobhan went to work. In this, she was support staff, and she could not say she minded. The warm night air smelled of some sweet flower she couldn't identify, tingling with magic that danced, invisible, over her skin. If this was in fact the inadvertent work of some addled terrakinetic, they were a very  _ powerful  _ terrakinetic. Wild magic whispered over all of Lorna’s senses, and she found it paradoxically soothing.

Though she might not be any form of healer or doctor, she was quite adept at doing what she called telepathic Xanax — and all the better, for the moment, thanks to her odd peace. She wove among the incoming patients like a small ghost, dispersing calm to all and sundry.

There were quite a lot of them, too, though there mercifully seemed to be few truly life-threatening injuries — it looked to be mainly head wounds, with some broken limbs for variety. Some were dazed, and others frightened, but most of those she saw were more annoyed than anything else, grumbling in a variety of languages that were gibberish to her.

Lorna found herself beside Pat, as they both cleaned the assorted abrasions of people who were probably swearing, if their tone was any indication. There was just enough blood that the faint, coppery scent of it joined the harsh, sterile smells of the hospital.  _ Those  _ seemed to be a constant the world over.

“Not how I planned on spending the evening,” her brother grumbled, as he tossed a soiled wet-wipe into a handy rubbish bin. “At least we’d mostly got through the food part’v dinner.”

“Eh, at least we’re useful,”she said. “And I’ll take this over that painful conversation. Sure Christ, I thought Saida was going to shank somebody. Which might’ve been entertaining, but not exactly helpful.”

Eris, like a tiny Jack-in-the-Box, appeared from seemingly nowhere. “Guys, I can’t get hold’v the DMA,” she said, her tone laced with anxiety. Fortunately, she’d said it in somewhat broken Irish, so their patients couldn’t understand it and worry. “Like, at all. No message, no answer service — nothing. I can’t even raise the Door-guards.” Neither Lorna nor Pat had ever seen the young woman so agitated, but her face was pinched with worry.

Lorna’s heart lurched, and plummeted into her stomach with a speed that left her almost ill. “Not even Geezer’s personal band?” she asked, also in Irish. She neatly tied off the gauze around her patient’s arm, and sent the young woman off to see a real doctor. “Or Gavin’s?” Their emergency satellite phones should get out past  _ anything _ . 

“Nobody’s,” her niece said. “I was going to try to get the kids home soon, but it’s like the whole fucking DMA went offline.”

“Jesus, Fun Size, this’ll cause a bloody panic when it gets out,” Pat said. He’d gone quite ashy, and his own patient, an elderly woman, was peering at him with distinct concern.

“And it’ll get out as soon as some injured person tries to get through the Door,” Lorna groaned. “Well...shit.” She could, in theory, prevent a panic, but she’d never tried doling out telepathic Xanax over a generalized area before. What the hell could have managed  _ that _ ? Miranda and Julifer had prepared for just about every scenario possible, and Katje and Geezer had taken care of the few they had missed. Hell, they’d run through drills for different sorts of terrorist attacks, so what the fuck?

“Should I keep trying?” Eris asked.

“Absolutely,” Lorna said. “And make sure the children don't happen to anyone.”

 

~

 

Geezer didn't know just who had chosen this particular alarm, but he wished he could stab them. He was pretty sure it hadn't been Miranda, who had favored sounds that couldn’t be mistaken for anything in the outer world — hers had included one that sounded so much like the Red Alert from  _ Star Trek  _ that she’d probably have been sued on Earth proper.  _ This  _ one, however, sounded far too much like a nuclear attack siren, and it made his dusty Cold War paranoia sit up and twitch within his mind. Both Julifer and Gavin were too young to properly understand why it gave him the heebie-jeebies.

“Can’t we shut that thing  _ off _ ?” he demanded. “We get it. Something went to shit.”

“I’m working on it.” Julifer’s voice was so strained he didn't want to press her further. The entire DMA had gone into automatic lockdown when the power cut; none of the Doors were opening until whatever the fuck this was got dealt with. Her fingers flew over the keyboard of her laptop, which was tapped into the DMA’s emergency wifi; just how that worked, Geezer didn't know, and at the moment he didn't care. The rise and fall of that godawful siren shook through him like a second, very slow heartbeat. It had been a very, very long time since he’d felt so useless; between it and that deep, undulating wail, he was more than ready to hit someone.

In the yellow glow of the emergency lights, Julifer typed furiously away, until the damn siren mercifully ceased. It was replaced by a much softer, far less grating alarm that sounded, of course, like the Yellow Alert. Sooner or later that would have to go, too, if anyone was to get any sleep — but  for now, it kept everyone on their toes.

“The Trees are fine,” she said, and the relief in her voice was so intense Geezer could actually feel it. “All right, this is either a terrorist or some kind of accidental systems failure. I’d have said both were impossible, because, well Miranda retrofitted this place. And Miranda was the most paranoid person who ever lived.”

Gavin frowned. He was reasonably well-informed about the DMA’s tech situation — enough to realize Julifer was right. “If it’s a terrorist, it’s someone too high up the damn food chain for my comfort,” he said. “If it’s an accident, more than one person wasn't just asleep at the switch, they were in a coma. Not sure which is worse.”

The timing, unfortunately, strongly suggested the former — why else would this be happening the one time Katje and Gerald were gone, and were supposed to be away for so long? And yet it wasn't like either of them could have done anything even if  they’d been in the DMA. Neither of them were tech whizzes.

“Well, hell,” Gavin said. “Now what?”

Geezer eyed him. The man had been a powerful telepath even before Lorna trained him. “Now you take a look at the telepaths,” he said, “and then they take a look at everyone else. It’ll take ages, and anyone who says no will have to go to lockup, but right now it’s all I’ve got.” Even in an emergency, Lorna had made it very, very clear that digging through someone’s mind against their will was Not Allowed. That didn't, however, mean they had to let the refusers just run around free.

“This,” Gavin sighed, “is totally gonna suck.” Actively reading someone just wasn't something you _did_ , unless that person was trying to show you something. Nobody wanted a telepathic addict — another Von Rached, who Lorna said had been as addicted to his telepathy as he was to his morphine. No thanks. The problem was, Gavin didn't have any better ideas — not yet.

At least telepathy was really common now — the DMA’s population was about 250,ooo, but there were so many telepaths that Geezer’s proposition might actually be doable.

“If we’re lucky, this won’t be  _ too _ much of a clusterfuck,” Geezer said. “I want the biggest bottle of whiskey in the universe when it’s over.”

Julifer snorted. “That’s the spirit.”

 

~

 

Mick was initially concerned about the Donovan kids, but it seemed he needn’t have worried. Donna and Sam seemed content to play under a stretcher — someone had got them a jar of tongue depressors — while Mairead, Jerry, and Saoirse dealt with cuts and scrapes without so much as batting an eye.

“They saw worse, on the ships.” Siobhan’s face was sheened lightly with sweat, her complexion a bit too grey for Mick’s liking. He’d drawn her aside to drink some water and eat a sandwich, hoping a little rest would help. She’d dealt with several ugly head wounds, and Ratiri had told him she didn't always know when to stop.

“I wish I could find that as disturbing as I ought to,” Mick said, as he picked at the grey threads in his sister’s aura. “Kids that young shouldn’t see anything that awful, but the War was hardly going to spare them because’v their age.”

An aftershock — far lighter than the earthquake — forestalled any immediate response. “This building isn’t going to collapse on our heads, is it?” she asked.

“It’s been reinforced,” Mick said, well aware he hadn't actually answered her question.

Siobhan winced, just a little. “Your confidence is overwhelming,” she said. “If we get squished, I’m blaming you.”

“Fair enough,” he said. “Though dammit, some of these people are going to have to go to the DMA, once we’ve got a chance to get them there.”

“Er,” Eris said, and startled half the life out of him — where the hell had she come from? “Yeah, about that…”

 

~

 

Little Miranda, exhausted from the day’s activities, was well and truly asleep in the suite’s sitting-room, and Katje was more than ready to christen the king-size bed in the bedroom.

“Are you sure that’s wise?” Gerald asked.

She gave him a grin as wicked as primordial sin. “We will just have to be quiet,” she said, as her fingers walked up his chest, “won’t we?”

He swallowed, and her grin grew, if possible, even more wicked. Gerald hadn't been a virgin when they met, but he wasn't precisely experienced, either — and Katje very much was. She’d taught him all sorts of things he never would have thought of, and he’d always been an apt pupil at anything he tried. In the inevitable note-comparison that went on among men, he discovered how very unusual Katje was.

What probably nobody else knew was that, in her former career as a call-girl, she’d been a dominatrix to two of her long-term clients. Gerald never would have thought he had anything like submissive tendencies, but boy did Katje make him enjoy it. “Yes ma’am.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Unfortunately, both their cell phones chose that moment to screech with all the melody of an old-school modem, followed by an ear-splitting  _ beeeeeep  _ that seemed to go on for far too long. A slightly robotic male voice said something in Swahili that was, of course, gibberish to both of them, but a moment later repeated itself in English. “A magnitude seven point eight earthquake has struck the municipality of Moshi at 19:39—”

“When?” Gerald asked. His knowledge of military time was nonexistent.

“7:39,” Katje said. 

“—and left widespread structure damage. More information will follow.”

The pair of them stared at one another, wide-eyed.  _ Well, that killed the mood,  _ Gerald thought. “Isn’t Moshi where the Donovans are?” 

“It is,” Katje said. “Of  _ course  _ it is. Put them all in one place and they are doom-magnets.” She grabbed her cell phone, and scrolled through her contacts until she found Lorna. Naturally, the call didn't even try to connect.

Gerald took the phone before she could throw it. “Katje, honey, I know you want to just charge in there like a rescue force, but we really ought to wait until morning,” he said. “It’s dark, it’s a long drive, we don't know the way, and things will be chaos right now. Tomorrow we can send Miranda home, and then see what we can do.”

“I hate it when you are reasonable,” she grumbled. “I will just keep trying.” Yes, she knew you were meant to keep off the phone in situations like this, but fuck it. Quite a lot of her family was out there, and she wasn't going to rest easy until she knew their status.

Miranda, woken by the stereo cell-phone screeching, hurried into their room. The poor kid was so wide-eyed there was no way she was going to sleep again any time soon. Fun apparently had to wait.

 

~

 

Lorna, by that point, thought she’d seen just about every nasty wound anything short of a lorry-crash could offer. The young man, carried on a makeshift stretched with half his head caved in, proved her very wrong — it was not a sight she’d forget, though Christ knew she’d try. She could actually see grey and pink bits of brain glistening in the uneven emergency lights; how they hell he could still be alive with so much of his skull in fragments, she didn't know, but at least he didn't seem to be in pain. Could even the healers salvage that mess? It was so alien, so  _ wrong _ , and while she didn't sick up, somebody else did. Very noisily. The sound of it splattering on the floor just made her gorge rise again.

An older woman, babbling with grief, trailed after the stretcher. Lorna didn't know just what she was saying, but she didn't need to — if the woman wasn't the lad’s mother, she’d be very surprised. The bright, cheerful scarf wrapped over the woman’s head was jarringly at odds with her terror, and some part of Lorna found it almost obscene.

She ooched through the crowd, and all but ambushed the lady from behind. Both of her tiny hands folded over the woman’s right, and she infused every ounce of telepathic Xanax she could into that horror-stricken mind.  _ Everyone will do what they can,  _ she said, and hoped like hell the woman spoke English.  _ My sister is a healer, and she’s not the only one here. Don't go grieving for him while he’s still alive. Is he your son? _

The woman, terribly startled, looked down at Lorna.  _ My oldest,  _ she said.  _ Can they save him? _

As much as Lorna wanted to say ‘yes’, Ratiri had told her once that no doctor worth their salt ever made promises to a patient that couldn’t necessarily be kept.  _ I don't know,  _ she said.  _ But I know they’ll do their best. What’s your name? _

_ Grace. _

_ Nice to meet you, Grace. I’m Lorna. Now, you’ve got a hospital full’v Donovans, and while we might not be the Lady, we tend to bludgeon reality until it gives us what we want.  _ She wasn't entirely exaggerating, either.

Grace’s eyes widened.  _ You are  _ that  _ Lorna? _

_ Sadly, yes. Now, hard as it is, you don't need to be watching what they do to your son. A healer in action can be a pretty gruesome sight, but I can keep an eye out and see when it’d be better for you to go to him,  _ Lorna said, and tapped her temple.  _ Meanwhile, I’m a good head shorter than just about everyone, and I could use some help. _

_ You are trying to distract me, aren’t you?  _ Grace asked.

_ Pretty much,  _ Lorna admitted,  _ but I’m not kidding — I really could use the help. At my height, crowds can be a no-go, and this isn’t a situation where I ought to be kicking people. _

Dark eyes bored into hers.  _ You will tell me when there is anything to know about my son? _

_ I promise. _

 

_ ~ _

 

Eris, once assured her twins were going nowhere, went back out into the soft night air. Her Gift was terrakinesis, but it was of little use indoors.

She wove her way through the gathering crowd, until she passed out to actual, somewhat dusty dirt. Off came her sandals, and her feet made contact with the earth.

Surprisingly, it did little good. The ground was unstable, but anyone with half a brain could have worked that out. Magic flared through every fault-line, but that too was expected. It sparked along her nerves like lightning, and a shiver ran up her spine.

Could this be stabilized? Eris didn't know how many terrakinetics there were in the general area, nor what state they might be in. She also knew fuck-all about the actual geological workings of Kilimanjaro and everything around it, which didn't exactly help.

_ Eris, help me out,  _ she thought  _ — _ a plea to the goddess who was her namesake. Sharley had said the real Eris hadn't gone back to sleep after the Angel was dealt with, and maybe, just maybe, she’d hear that prayer. One thing was certain: life was a whole lot weirder when you knew for a fact that your deity of choice actually existed.

Her eyes traced Kilimanjaro, which loomed in dark silhouette against a field of stars. With the power cut throughout what seemed to be most of town, there was no light pollution to obscure them, and she couldn't help but think that this was what everything was meant to look like  _ — _ what it  _ had  _ looked like for who knew how many millions of years. Humans might live around (and on, in some cases) the mountain, but they didn't own it and never had. Its bones were as old as the continent.

Dammit, she needed to find the other terrakinetics, and hope they spoke enough English for her to get her idea across. Maybe this  _ could  _ be stabilized, but it wasn't going to be easy. Eris had a nasty suspicion they were going to have to go to the mountain itself — just not high enough to risk altitude sickness.

Fucking brilliant.

 

~

 

At first, the doctors and nurses side-eyed Mairead and Jerry pretty hard, but the twins were both pushy and not afraid of blood, so they were cleaning and bandaging wounds before anybody knew what was happening. IT wasn't until Mairead sterilized herhands and nabbed a suture kit that anyone really paused.

“Child, you should not do that.” The doctor who addressed her was a soft-voiced woman with eyes filled with strain.

_ “It’s okay,”  _ Mairead said, even as she swabbed the arm of a very dubious girl not much older than she was — a girl who’d obviously had a dose of morphine or aura-cleaning, given how glazed her eyes were.  _ “My da taught me, in the DMA hospital.”  _ True, it had been on a banana, but these two didn't need to know that — just like they didn't need to know that Mam wasn't the only one who could dole out telepathic Xanax. The healers were probably all busy with the poor guy who came in with half his skull smashed, but Mairead could do this.

The Xanax must have worked, because the doctor subsided. Mairead’s tiny hands were steady as she closed the gash on the other girl’s arm with a row of neat sutures. Jerry swabbed, though he didn't look thrilled about it. He never had got as into medicine and medical stuff as his sister. Unlike her, he couldn't totally shut out the din that echoed off the concrete walls, so focusing was kind of hard.

“Who are you?” the injured girl asked.

_ “I”m Mairead, and he’s Jerry,”  _ Mairead said.  _ “We’re older than we look.”  _ Which was technically true — they just weren’t as much older than she implied. Not that anyone would believe that.  _ “Are you here with anyone?” _

“I think Papa broke his leg,” the girl said. “What happens if  there is another earthquake? There has not been one like that before.”

_ “Dunno,”  _ Jerry said.  _ “We’d have to ask a grown-up, but it’d need to be the  _ right  _ grown-up. Right now I guess we just cross our fingers and hope there isn’t one.”  _ Even he knew how reassuring that wasn't, but it was all he had.

 

~

 

Gavin hated everything.  _ Everything. _

Actively searching someone’s mind went so much against his training that it made him twitch, but at least he’d made it through the Door-guards. They were the ones who routinely skirted the grey areas — skimming surface thoughts, to weed out potential terrorists. Since he was not one of them, he was glad enough that each one passed his test.

Just now he sat, grey and drained, in the makeshift office. Julifer was off with the eggheads, but Geezer had ducked in for coffee and a quick cigarette. 

“What if it’s like Von Rached?” the old man asked, as he exhaled a cloud of blue-grey smoke.

Gavin massaged his forehead. It was probably too much to hope his growing headache would go away. “Man, you’ve gotta be more specific.”

“What kicked off the first storm three years ago was Von Rached using a bunch of people he’d turned into sleeper agents,” Geezer said. “People who had no idea he’d done it until he tapped ’em. I’m not sure anybody alive could do it on  _ that  _ scale, but if their target’s just the DMA, they wouldn’t have to. It ain’t just Katje and Gerald that’re gone — Lorna’s not here, either. I doubt that’s a coincidence.”

“That’s still awfully damn risky, if that’s the case,” Gavin said. “Lorna might be the strongest we’ve got, but it’s not like the rest of us are weak. We can dig pretty damn deep into somebody’s brain.”

Geezer’s faded blue eyes were piercing. “Not like her, you can’t,” he said. “She didn't teach any of you how. Only reason she knows herself is because of Von Rached. She don't want anyone else to have that temptation — especially not telepaths as strong as you. You’re smart enough that you don't need that.”

Gavin snorted. “Wish I was smart enough to know what else to do. Wish we had Sharley.” Everyone’s favorite blue-haired deity visited the Other somewhat regularly, and of fucking course she was there now — and even if they weren’t in a communications blackout, there was no way to reach her when she was offworld.  _ That  _ had to be pure accident, since Sharley didn't exactly announce her departures in advance.

“She’s been gone a week,” Geezer said, drowning his cigarette butt in a mostly-empty Styrofoam cup of coffee. “She oughtta be home soon. Meanwhile,l we’ve just gotta keep on keeping on — and don't kill yourself in the process.”

That drew a grimace from Gavin. His temples were throbbing like a second heartbeat; he needed an aura-manipulator before this got worse. “Might be easier said than done. Anybody found Charlese yet?” He doubted she was inside, but he had to ask.”

“Not yet. This time of night, she’s probably gone home.”

“Lucky her,” Gavin sighed.

 

~

 

Charlese was not a happy bunny. She’d been been monitoring Tanzanian news feeds, which were bad enough on their own. Her inability to contact anyone in the DMA was a good ten times worse.

She and Marty made their way through the echoing tunnels, which were already filling. Unsurprisingly, a crowd had gathered around the Door -- the stubbornly closed Door.

“Charlese, what do we do?” Nuala Doyle asked, as if she expected Charlese to actually have an answer. The pale pixie of a woman was a nurse at the clinic, and had probably been sent to find out what the hell was going on.

Charlese wracked her brain, which fortunately coughed up something. “We’ve got a procedure for this,” she said. “Shut the gate, and put guards along the perimeter. Nothing’s gonna get over the hedge, but you never know who might try to go under it. If they kept busy, they might not feel so helpless. “And somebody needs to keep trying the intercom.” The cell towers in Moshi were probably jammed, but Ratiri had taken the satellite phone. Hopefully it was still in one piece, because Charlese had a call to make.

Marty tugged on her shirt. Big, mismatched, milky eyes looked up at her. “D’you want me to try to find Mama?”

That...was a tough one. Marty could technically pass between Earth and the Other, but unlike her mother, she couldn't control where she wound up when she crossed over. The Other might not be as big as Earth, but it was hardly small; if the kid wound up somewhere over what Sharley called the Edge of the Real, she’d be stuck on foot walking Christ knew how many miles. 

“Not yet, honey,” Charlese said. “Might come to that later, but for now I could use your help.” She wasn't being patronizing, either. Marty, being dead, didn't need sleep, and she was a smart kid who was technically old enough to be Charlese’s mother. She might well be more help than some of the adults on the mountain.

 

~

 

Eventually, the flood of patients had trickled to a halt, and a load of very exhausted Donovans sat out beneath the stars. Only Eris was missing; she was, Lorna discovered, still off in conference with the other terrakinetics.

Lorna herself was so tired she was secretly ashamed, and absolutely did not want to admit it had to at least partially be due to age. Never had she been so aware that she was on the downhill slope to fifty.

_ Oh, stop it,  _ she told herself.  _ Gran was like the Energizer bloody Bunny until the day she died. _

“We need rest, mo chroí,” Ratiri said. “Let’s just drag our beds outside and sleep under the starlight.”

That sounded far too appealing to deny, and Christ knew they’d done all they could. Any more and they’d just wind up patients themselves, and that would help no one.

“I can’t think’v a better plan,” she said, “unless Mick’s staying.”

“Mick,” the man in question said, “is being sent home for a snack and a nap. I’d stay here, but all the beds are full, and I don't fancy the idea’v a sleep on concrete.”

“I can’t leave Eris,” Siobhan said. “I know she’s a Donovan and all, but she’s my kid, and she’d be alone in a place where she doesn’t speak most’v the languages.”

“She’s going up onto the mountain,” Saoirse said, through a yawn. “She and the terrakientics want to stabilize shite as much as they can, but they can’t do it from here. She also said they want to find the arsehole that lost his reason and did this in the first place.”

Lorna didn't ask how her niece knew that. The girl was a little too good at picking up information, whether anyone wanted her to or not. Right now, Lorna doubted anyone would complain.

“Brilliant,” she said. “Siobhan, you’re no use as you are right now. Let’s get out’v here, before one’v us keels over.”

 

~

 

Mick was so exhausted that Mairead wound up driving him home, and unrepentantly kept the bus to get the rest of them back to the inn. Beds were dragged outside, and the entire lot of them collapsed into sleep so deep they were all but comatose.


	4. Chapter Four

The night had grown downright chilly, and Eris was glad someone had foisted a warm coat on her before they left. It was too big, of course, and it smelled like hospital — sharp chemicals she couldn't name. What mattered was that it was warm, since her legs and feet were freezing.

There were eighteen of them traversing this trail, armed with flashlights. Moshi had more terrakinetics but this group were the only ones physically capable of making the hike. How much good they would do was debatable, and the further they went, the less confident any of them were.

Eris was just trying not to let on how fucking out-of-shape she was — apparently, the walks she took to visit her mam weren’t nearly enough, because just now she’d be huffing and puffing if she let herself.

Far, far beneath her feet, the ground trembled. She doubted any but a terrakinetic would have felt it; as it was, she was not the only one who paused. Off her sandals came again, so that her feet made direct contact with the cold earth.

“Christ, I don't like this at all,” she said. She knelt, and ran careful fingers over the packed trail. The shudder was so deep, but it was unlike anything she’d ever felt before, and she lived in an area that was more geologically active than most people knew. Her Gift was a strong one, but nature was nature; ultimately, it still did what it wanted. “Is this anything like normal around here?”

“No.” The speaker’s name was Daniel, and Eris was pretty sure he wasn't much older than her. “There are always many tiny quakes, but this is different. This is like nothing I have ever known.”

A general collection of murmurs agreed with him. Eris wished she could be surprised.

“Well... _shit_ ,” she said, sitting back on her heels. So close to the ground, the dewy scent of unknown undergrowth joined the faint, harsh smell of her coat. “Guys, I’ve got to be honest: I’ve never done anything like this. Not on this scale, or that depth. I know we need to do as much as we can, but I'm worried it won’t be as much as we’d thought, unless anybody’s got any bright ideas.” This was not, after all, her turf — though her training was fairly extensive, it had all been on the West Coast of the U.S, and not all geological activity was equal.

“We cannot go that deep underground,” Daniel said, “but we can reinforce above. It will not be perfect, but it will be better than nothing.”

“My uncle Geezer says anything’s better than nothing.” Jesus, what the fuck was going on in the DMA? Eris hadn't been able to keep calling once she was in a group, because she didn't want anyone getting wind of this and panicking. They had enough to deal with, thanks so much.

Deep, deep beneath the earth, something shifted again — something the like of which she’d never felt. It was so alien that a shiver crept up her spine, tingling along her nerves.

“This is not an accident,” Daniel said. His tone was laced with so much dread that Eris could practically taste it; Uncle Ratiri had said once that fear tasted like metal, and she fancied, just now, that she knew what he meant.

“I thought all this area’s terrakinetics were accounted for,” she said, and hated the wobble in her voice. “And the guide said the asshole who’d done this was sedated, or something.”

The young woman beside her swallowed. “You felt that,” she said. “This is deep. This is _wrong_. One person could not do this. You do not live here — you can’t know what is and isn’t natural. This is someone’s work, and more than one someone.”

Considering the eighteen of them were managing fuck-all, Eris couldn’t imagine how the hell that could be, and didn't want to try. “Is there some particular fault they’re tapping? Something that they just have to hit hard enough, and the earth’ll do the rest?” That horrible, alien shiver remained, and grew with every passing second.

“Seven, that we know of,” Daniel said. “We need to evacuate the city. We can go through the DMA.”

Eris shut her eyes. “No, we can’t,” she sighed. “Nobody can get through to the DMA. Something’s gone really fucking wrong there, too, though don't go telling anyone I told you that yet.”

She didn't need to see them looking at her to feel the weight of their collective stare. _Shit._

“Then we go to Arusha,” Daniel said, with a firmness she hoped he actually felt. “The hospital will be the hardest to evacuate, but it is far away from any lahar.”

Memory of the traffic on the road to Moshi made her cringe. It had been bad enough in daylight, and they’d be doing this in the dark, because what streetlights the town had were as dead as the rest of the power. And what about the ash? She knew what ash did when sucked into an engine, but what choice did they have? “Fuck it,” she said. “Let’s do it, and hope the goddamn mountain cooperates.”

As if to spite her, the earth didn't even let her finish speaking before it jerked so violently it knocked several of them off their feet, and lurched her heart right along with it. Deep, deep below, the fault lines shifted, and opened channels that surged with a force that left her reeling. Not until now had she known just where Kilimanjaro’s active cone was, but she was suddenly all too aware of it.

“Oh, for fuck’s _sake_ ,” she growled, staggering. “I guess this is the part where we run.”

 

~

 

A very frustrated Charlese paced the length of the Donovan kitchen, which was filled with the scent of apple cider and the scattered rainbows cast from half a dozen prisms.

She’d been trying the sat phone over and over for the past three hours, with no luck. At first she’d got a busy signal, and then nothing at all. Surely _all_ the damn Donovans couldn’t be totally incapacitated...right? Anxiety squeezed her heart ever tighter each time she hit redial.

Marty, still and silent as a statue, watched her from the top of the fridge. Auntie Charlese looked ready to have a stroke, even if Marty was pretty sure she was too young for that. It might be time to go look for Mama after all, and to to hell with any chance of getting lost. It wasn't like anything in the Other could hurt her.

Charlese all but fainted when someone _finally_ answered the phone. The voice that greeted her was Eris’s, accompanied by some awfully labored breathing.

“Look, this is a shit time,” the woman gasped. “Everybody’s alive and unhurt for now, but I can't get through to the DMA, and oh yeah, fucking Kilimanjaro’s erupting.”

Charlese froze. “ _What?”_ ” she demanded. “Since when’s Kilimanjaro a volcano?”

“Since forever, apparently. Look, Charlese, I’ve gotta go — I’m having a hell of a time keeping up with everyone else. Someone’ll call you later, okay?” She hung up before Charlese could answer.

“I’m gonna go get Mama,” Marty said, in a tone suddenly, jarringly adult. “If I come out in the wrong place, I can just come back. You’ve just gotta hold out if you can.”

Shit. With the way time worked in the Other, it might be a week before the two got back. Still, Charlese wasn't exactly coming up with any better ideas. “Good luck, honey,” she said. “Try not to get eaten.”

Marty smiled. The girl had lived here so long that it was actually kind of easy to forget she was a zombie, even with her complexion and milky eyes. That smile was a disturbingly stark reminder that she wasn't just dead, she wasn't and never had been human. “Nothing’s gonna try,” she said. With that, she hopped off the fridge, and vanished before she could hit the floor.

Charlese shuddered, and wondered not for the first time, how the hell this was her life.

 _So what now?_ she thought. The phone had to stay with her, but she couldn't keep pacing the kitchen. She was sure something had to be done out on the mountain, so she’d better go see what it was.

 

~

 

Siobhan was far too tired to be jerked out of a sound sleep, but jerked she was, with a vengeance. God dammit, it felt like it had been all of five minutes since she’d keeled over.

Blinking blearily, it took a moment for both brain and eyes to focus. Pat had been telling her for years that she needed glasses, and each time she'd told him to get fucked, because dammit, she wasn't fifty yet. Christ, she was still so exhausted her limbs felt like they were filled with rocks, so heavy she struggled to sit up.

The sun was over the horizon, so she’d obviously been asleep at least an hour. With a truly miserable groan, she sat up, but paused when her bare feet hit the ground. It almost felt like it was... _vibrating_ , somehow. “Eris?” she called. Her voice sounded like someone had scoured her throat with sand before they stuffed it into her brain.

 _“No Mam.”_ Little Donna stood up in the crib, staring at her Gran with wide pale eyes. _“Where Mam?”_

Siobhan’s heart sank. She tried to tell herself that her daughter was busy, and it was no wonder they hadn't heard from her. “Mam’s working, allanah,” she said, and scrubbed a hand over her face. Had there been an earthquake at all, or had she just dreamt it?

As if in answer, the earth heaved with a rumble so deep it rattled her teeth. She gripped the edge of the bed, bloody glad they’d all gone to sleep outdoors, where nothing could land on them—

The loudest sound she’d ever heard in her life burst through her head like the fucking Big Bang — so loud it sent her temporarily deaf, pain lancing through her ears and straight into her brain. She couldn't even hear the twins when they started crying.

 _“Gran, what dat?”_ Sam asked, tears streaming down his cheeks. _“What dat?”_ One tiny finger pointed at the mountain.

Siobhan, head ringing like the bells of bloody Notre Dame, followed the line of that finger. A ball of leaden dread dropped into her stomach when the mountain effectively answered her grandson’s question: a plume of ash shot skyward, billowing out into monstrous grey clouds. _No,_ she thought, as panic gripped her heart in an iron vice. _No, no, NO_. Dimly, almost inaudible over the ringing in her ears, came the strident wail of an alarm, rising and falling and rising again.

She snatched both children up, stuffed her feet into her sandals, and somehow clambered right over the wall to Pat’s garden. Brother and niece were wide-awake and pale with terror.

“Pat, look after these two,” she said, depositing the twins on either side of him. “I’ve got to go find Eris.”

It took a moment for her words to filter through his abused eardrums, but lunatic though the idea was, he said nothing in protest. Eris was her daughter, and God knew he’d plunge into absolutely anything for his own. Fuck, Saoirse was the only reason he wasn't going with her. “You be careful, Shiv,” he ordered, his voice every bit as strained as he felt. “You get your arse back here safe, or I’ll send Lorna into that pale forest to haul you home by your hair.”

He said it with the full, sinking awareness that this might be the last time he ever spoke to her. Between Washington and Oregon, there were nine technically active volcanoes of all sorts — and they’d become all the more active since terrakinesis became a thing. It meant the mountain had bi-annual eruption drills, and everyone who lived there had learned far more about volcanoes than some of them were strictly comfortable with — Pat included. The heat of a pyroclastic flow would kill a person well before the ash cloud itself got there, and it traveled so, so bloody fast.

Unsteadily he stood, and folded his sister in a fierce hug. “I mean it,” he said. “Get back here. Get Eris, and get to safety.”

“I will,” Siobhan said, with a conviction even he could tell she didn't feel. And then she was gone, and he was left with three sobbing children, though he was not alone for long.

Lorna, Ratiri, and their twins burst through the front door of his room, and then out the back. “Mick’s getting the children onto his bus and sending them to Arusha,” Ratiri said. “Pat, you’re driving.”

“But—” he started.

“Pat, your Gift’s the least use here,” Lorna said, “and this lot’s got to have a Donovan at the wheel or it won’t end well. Where the fuck are Shiv and Eris?”

“Eris is still...not here,” Pat groaned. “Shiv went after her. Yes, I know she's bloody mental, but I couldn't've stopped her with an army."

Lorna stared at him, stricken. "Jesus, Pat," she whispered, scarcely able to hear her own voice. "They'd best make it out so I can murder the pair’v them.”

“But—” Pat tried again.

Lorna held a finger over his lips. _One’v us has got to get out, Pat,_ she said, and even in her mental tone there was brutal honesty. _If the rest’v us don't make it, somebody’s got to look after all these kids, and it’s better if it’s a Donovan. Now shift your arse while there’s still time._

“What will you do?” he whispered. The stubborn fire in his sister’s good eye was as implacable as it was familiar. It told him, in no uncertain terms, that there was no point in arguing. He wasn't going to win.

_If nothing else, I can try to contain that ash cloud. I can try to keep it from swamping Moshi._

Telepathic responses had never been easy for Pat, but Saoirse didn't need to be hearing this. _You can stop some’v the ash, but Lorna, telekinesis won’t stop the heat._

 _The heat travels before the ash,_ she said. _Stop the ash far enough away and you’ll take the heat with it._

He swallowed, hard. _Even you can’t do that._

The fire in her eye stoked to a green inferno. _Oh Pat,_ she said, _you’ve got no idea what I can do. The only one who knew is dead._

Her tone was so flat and so final that it chilled him to the core. He was suddenly unable to meet her burning gaze; all he _could_ do was exactly what he was told.

 

~

 

When Pat reached Mick’s house, the bus was rapidly stuffed almost past capacity with children, including Mick’s own. Many of the older children held babies, who were in varying states of unhappiness and grizzled accordingly.

Pat drove as fast as he could get away with — there was as yet little traffic. He had to tell himself that he was at least doing _something_ useful — his Gift might be worth a tin shit when it came to the volcano, but if nothing else, he could get these children to safety. Whether or not most of them would have parents later was not something he could let himself contemplate.

The sun rose golden-orange as he drove, and with it rose the heat. The bus’s air conditioning was no match for the warmth of twenty-odd humans packed like sardines inside it, and he stomped on the accelerator. Those babies had to get somewhere cool, and he couldn't afford to worry about the cloud of red dust he left in his wake.

“Da, are we gonna die?” Saoirse asked. Her tone was almost eerily calm, and when he glanced at her, there was an odd lack of fear on her sweat-beaded face.

“No, allanah,” he said, with surprising surety. “We’re Donovans. It’ll take a fuck’v a lot more than a volcano to kill us.”

He could only hope he was right.

 

~

 

There wasn’t a motor vehicle to be had for love nor money, but not all the bicycles had been nabbed. Once Saida and her family’s elders had been squashed into a van, Lorna, Ratiri, and Mick made for the mountain by bike. They were three of the precious few who were lunatic enough to do it.

Mindful of the approaching ashfall, they all had cloths tied over their mouths and noses, and Ratiri and Mick wore safety glasses; Lorna was the only one who was able to wear Zhara’s swim goggles, so wear them she did.

The ashfall started well before they reached the base of the mountain — fat, grey flakes, like dirty snow. It screened the sun, and strained the light into sickly amber.

It was here that Lorna parted from her husband and her brother; they had quite a ways to go before they reached the medical center, and she had to make sure it was still standing when they got there.

Ratiri kissed her forehead through his bandanna. _Don't kill yourself for this, mo chroí._

 _Allanah, you know I'll do what I need to,_ she said gently. _I can do this. Go._

Go they did, and left her to face the mountain. In all honesty, she had no idea if she could do this or not. Sure, she was powerful, but this was a goddamn _volcano_. Worse, she didn't know the terrain at all; she had no idea where she could safely direct any lahars.

 _Von Rached wouldn’t doubt himself,_ she thought. Lorna had suspected for years that he’d powered through a few things with the sheer force of his own arrogance. There had to have been times he accomplished something purely because he refused to accept any possibility that he couldn’t. And as much as she’d utterly hated that attitude, it might serve her now. That sort of arrogance was alien to her nature, but not for nothing had she carried an echo of him in her mind three years ago.

_All right, you fuckstick. Do me a favor and do something useful._

She did her level best to summon that arrogance, even as the ash cloud billowed and spread. Out, out went her telekinesis, searching for anything that felt like the hot flakes that dusted what little of her face was exposed. Breathing through the cloth was not so much fun — she could blame so many years of smoking for _that_ one — but it beat the alternative.

Bit by bit she found the column’s edges, each ashy, scorching distortion of the air. It was a damn could thing she couldn’t feel pain through her telekinesis, because she could tell, even at this distance, just how hot it really was. Jesus, what the hell did she think she was doing? Was she totally insane?

 _It isn’t sentient, Lorna. It cannot actually fight you._ The thought felt just alien enough to give her pause, and she scowled.

 _It’s a_ volcano _. It doesn’t have to fight me._ Somehow, her mounting annoyance fed into that artificial arrogance, as she drew herself up to what passed for her full height. She’d worry about the implications of all of this later, when she had the luxury of time. For now, the phantom heat of the ash cloud pressed against her telekinesis.

With all her might, Lorna pushed back, upward as high as it would go. Yeah, it might fuck up the weather patterns in this part of Africa for a while, but let the weather-manipulators handle that once the volcano was finished belching. She so rarely used her telekinesis for anything truly major, and the sheer force of it now would have shocked her if she’d let it. In this moment, an echo of Von Rached’s utterly obnoxious certainty in his own power coursed like lightning through her nerves.

Though no one knew the cause nor source of magic, many suspected it drew power from the Earth itself, and that those with stronger Gifts were simply better at channeling that power than others. Lorna could not claim to even have a decent guess as to how that could actually work, but it made as much sense as anything. So much power surged beneath her, around her, raining down like the ash as she did all she could to route the lahars into whatever hollows and low glades she could find through her blind telekinesis — anything to at least slow it down.

It hurt — oh dear bloody Christ did it hurt, pain as hot as the ash flooding her veins like molten lead, but up the ash went. She couldn't do this much longer or she'd keel over, but goddammit, she was not done yet.

_Yes you can. You will do what is needed, Lorna Duncan, and damn the consequences for now._

"Oh, fuck _off_ ," Lorna growled. Her voice was heavily muffled by the cloth. "I said be useful, not a pain in the arse." But the pain could cripple her later, assuming she survived long enough. For now let it flare dull and red, subsumed beneath the iron of a will that had learned in a very hard school. Fuck this volcano and whatever passed for the horse it rode in on.

 

~

 

The hospital, predictably, was utterly chaotic.

The worst of the patients were already loaded for transport, at least, but the roads became more clogged with each passing moment. It was so bad that any vehicle capable of it was off-roading for as long and far as it could do so.

Inside, the hospital was hot as a sauna; the vents had already choked on the ash, so there would be no air conditioning, or even fresh air. The metallic taste of funk and fear was almost overpowering, even without the onion stink of sweat. Ratiri had to plunge forward and just attempt to shut down his sense of smell.

His lack of Swahili almost instantly served him ill, because so many reverted to it in their terror. He could not tell them where to go, or what they should do when they got there; all he could do was pull at auras until his fingers felt burned to the bone, while Mick actually did something useful.

At least the chaos gave Ratiri little opportunity to worry about Lorna, or Eris, or Siobhan — and indeed, the latter two actually found him in fairly short order, along with the rest of the terrakinetics that had gone up the mountain. Their faces were streaked with sweat and ash, and they panted heavily through the strips of T-shirt they’d tied over their mouths and noses, but they were alive.

“Oh good,” he sighed, his relief a palpable thing. “Siobhan, Eris, if you’re not half dead you need to take one of the loaded cars and get out of here, before the ash gets so heavy your engine chokes.”

“Fuck, Uncle Ratiri, do you really think we can do this?” Eris asked. Her wide eyes were red from rubbing the ash out of them.

“We don't have a choice,” he said. And yes, he had an ulterior motive; Siobhan was too damn exhausted to be of much use here, but she and Eris could at least get some people to safety. “Your aunt’s doing what she can about the ash cloud, and we’ve sent out some weather-manipulators to help her. Nobody can stop this thing, but we might be able to mitigate it.”

“Uncle Ratiri, there’s this guy named Daniel, he’s a terrakinetic, and he said someone had to’ve done this on purpose,” Eris said, with lowered voice. “Just so you know.”

Ratiri wished heartily that she hadn't just said that, but there was no forgetting it. Deal with it later, when and if they could. “Brilliant,” he sighed. “Go on, the red van at the back hasn’t got a driver, but it’s stuffed full of passengers. Mick’s got the keys.”

Go they did, and he breathed just a touch easier. Yes, it was selfish of him to be relieved that his loved ones were getting the hell out. No, he did not care. The fear of so many other people was pressing ever harder on his senses — he didn't need any more of his own than he already felt.

The jaundiced glow of the emergency lights had been bad enough, but another, violent tremor of the earth cut off even that, and plunged the room into darkness. The cries of shock and fear assaulted his ears like knives, and for one terrible moment he feared he’d suffocate in the blackness.

Some blessed pyrokinetic raised a hand, and created an impromptu torch. It allowed electric torches to be found and turned on, but the volume barely abated.

Mick’s voice rose above the din, and the man himself climbed up onto a table, torch in hand. His words were in Swahili, and his tone was, Ratiri suspected, far calmer than than felt. Still, Mick’s words had some effect, because the chaos died down...somewhat.

 _What the hell are we going to do?_ Ratiri wondered. Even with all their vehicles jammed past capacity, there were simply too many patients. Those who could walk unaided had already gone, for the most part, protecting their eyes and lungs as best they could. If a lahar caught them, they were doomed, but anyone in the hospital wouldn’t fair much better for long. The building would just delay the inevitable, and briefly at that.

 _Don't die, Lorna. Know when to fold._ Then again, if she folded, she’d die anyway. They all might.

 

~

 

This jam-packed van was old, but sturdy enough that Siobhan, once she’d made sure none of her passengers would die if she off-roaded, did just that.

Her progress was slow going, because even with the headlamps, the morning was dark as a moonless night. The windscreen wipers kept up with the ash, at least, and there was less of that than Siobhan had expected. There had to be some weather-manipulators out there, too, because that was just too damn much for Lorna to be handling on her own.

“Mam, how long have we got until the engine clogs?” Eris asked — in Irish, fortunately.

“Not long enough,” her mother said grimly. “You lot, hold on back there. Off we fucking go.”

The van lurched, but the ground was level enough to be getting on with. She dared pick up a bit of speed, her only thoughts being, _away, away, fucking away._ The lahars when Mount St. Helens erupted had gone fifty fucking miles, and they had a hell of a long way to go to reach that distance.

“Mam, where are Sam and Donna?” Eris’s voice was not quite steady.

“Your Uncle Pat left with them when the mountain first blew,” Siobhan said. “There wasn't any traffic yet — they’ll be miles away by now.”

Beside her, Eris sagged with relief. “They’ll get out. They’ve got to.”

“ _We’ve_ got to,” her mother corrected. Maybe splitting up with the main convoy was a good idea or a totally shit, one, but either way, they were committed now. All that mattered was _away_.

 

~

 

Marty hand landed at all where she wanted, but it could have been worse. She wasn't over the Edge of the Real, or in the forest even Jary wouldn’t fly over; she’d turned up just outside New Echo, which meant they could at least call Mama Tanya and Jary, and see where the hell Mama was. Easy peasy, hopefully.

Being back in the Other was always kinda weird, now. Marty had lived in the Swamp for decades, but she’d been born on Earth, and spent the first five years of her life under a blue sky, not a red one. Living on the mountain had reminded her just how pretty that was -- blue sky, and living trees, and rain, and especially stars. Coming back to the Other felt like losing something, even if she couldn't have said what, or how, or why.

Maybe it was because the Other never changed. A storm was brewing in the dull red sky, but there was never any rain. Rain, like sun and moon and stars, was an Earth thing -- something the Other once had, long before Marty or Mama were born, but no longer. The air smelled like lightning, even to Marty’s dulled senses, but it always smelled like that, storm or no storm.

Leaves that had fallen four hundred years ago crunched beneath her shoes as she walked, making for the compound that was New Echo. Nobody knew exactly why, but nothing ever rotted or decayed in the Other; it was why Old Echo was still standing, even with no one to live there or take care of it. Things just slowly died, and were turned into their own monument, whatever that even meant. Granddad had said that, but her granddad was admittedly really weird.

New Echo loomed in front of her. It was a giant brick building that had once been a shopping mall, before the War. Marty didn't know how it could look so modern when it was four hundred years old, because it looked like something on modern Earth, but Time was weird in the Other. Mama Tanya said it was pretty messed-up even before the War, which just made it ten times worse.

She also said the people in New Echo were delusional, because the Edge of the Real shifted all the time, and this was the closest it had ever been to the city-building, which was so much bigger now than it had been four centuries ago. There were gates and guards and fences topped with razor-wire they got from...somewhere, Marty was never quite sure, along with big steel shutters that could close over all the doors and windows in an emergency, but Mama Tanya said that wasn't going to stop some of what lived over the Edge, so someday she and Granddad were going to have a lot of work to do when the place inevitably fell. It meant Marty would get more brothers and sisters, at least.

It wasn't often that Mama Tanya or any of them came out here, but everybody knew about her zombie children. The big man in the tower, with his even bigger gun, only eyed her warily for a moment before he let her in. He really was a _big_ man, too, probably close to as tall as Granddad, but young, with a freckled brown face and dark, dark eyes.

“Hi,” she said. “I need to call my mama. She’s either with Mama Tanya or Captain Jary, I dunno which. Something’s wrong at home.”

“I hope I’m not gonna regret this, kid. C’mon.”


	5. Chapter Five

At the hospital, they were reduced to wheeling the last patients out in wheelchairs or stretchers, covered as best they could be with mosquito netting. It was a fool’s hope and  Mick well knew it, but the hospital would not be structurally sound much longer — one more quake and something would give.

Realistically, they were all going to die, but he was strangely calm. Saida and the children were well away by now; they would survive, and if nothing else, he could say those left behind had done everything they could. Maybe the whirling ash might suffocate them, or a lahar sweep them away, but dammit, they were doing everything within their power. More than that no one could reasonably ask.

 _Pat’s away,_ he told himself, as he pushed along a young man on a gurney. The wheels jerked and lurched over the road, and he was sweating like a pig, but on they went. _Pat and the kids, and Saida right behind them. And Shiv’ll get there, come hell or high water._ They’d take care of Saida and Zhara and James. That knowledge had to be enough.

He hazarded a glance at Ratiri, who was not nearly so sanguine. So much of his face was covered that his expression was hidden, but his aura was a mess of greys and crimson. Ash had settled on his clothes, and little bits of pumice had stuck in his hair. The pumice was what worried Mick; yeah, it was small now, and light, but a bigger chunk could rip the mosquito netting over their patients.

The A23 was so appalling that everyone on foot merely crossed over it, and went the back route. There were a whole cluster of medical campuses in the general area, but most of them had been so damaged by the earthquakes that they had, perhaps mercifully, not been filled. And yet the traffic was bad enough even so.

Panting, sweating, praying to even he knew not what, he suddenly felt every hair he had stand on end. A prickling of magic so intense it made his teeth ache danced along his skin, shuddering through him like a second heartbeat. A shiver ran up his spine that was so intense it was almost painful.

Above — far, far above — the ash shifted, as if with the passage of some giant visible only by what it displaced in its movements. Mick had absolutely no chance to wonder just what the fuck it was, though, because in its wake came the deep, teeth-rattling rumble the recognized quite well. A great shadow passed overhead, the growl of its massive engines subsiding into an idle as anchors fired, two at a time, into the earth. How they managed to avoid skewering anyone, Mick had no idea, but he was fully confident that they hadn't.

Ship. A ship had come. Maybe there was hope after all.

  


~

 

The ash rose, and rose, a whirling dance of grey as it hit the invisible wall Lorna did her best to maintain. At first there had been pain, pain that rose to agony as her Gift stretched to its absolute limits, but by now it had passed into an odd sort of euphoria. Her hands and her feet were strangely numb, her heart and pulse a jackhammer, and moment by moment her control eroded, but god dammit, she was not done. Unsurprisingly, the volcano was winning, but it wasn't going to take her out that easy. The sky was lighter; she was doing at least a little good, and refused to let herself think about the fact that it might well be futile. If even a few more people got out than would have without her interference, she’d call it worth it.

 _You know where you’ll go,_ she thought, even through her mania. The pale forest held no fear for her, even though she didn't know what lay beyond. No, she didn't want to die, but everyone did eventually, and this beat some...some pointless, senseless car accident, or a tree falling on her head because some eejit shouldn’t have been handed a chainsaw.

 _You can keep doing this, Lorna,_ the obnoxious little voice said.

“Oh, fuck off,” she said aloud, the words half growl, half gasp. Her artificial arrogance was failing with the rest of her, because even Von Rached wouldn’t be able to hold back _this_ nightmare. Another thought, wild and wholly her own, said, _you were right — this trip really_ was _a shit idea._

Lorna couldn’t help but laugh, raspy and hoarse in her throat. If by some miracle they survived this, she was never leaving the fucking mountain again. Ever.

Her vision was darkening at the edges, and she screamed delirious defiance at the mountain, dredging the well of what power she had left for one last blast. Without her willing it, she flipped the damn mountain off, and waited for unconsciousness that was surprisingly long in coming.

 _Okay,_ she told herself, for the second time in her life, _you can die now._

 

~

 

New Echo never really seemed to change.

Marty had been here a few times, with Mama and with Mama Tanya. It was big, and also really obvious it had once been a mall — a mall right out of the 1980s, too. Ugly brown tile floor, escalators that had long since stopped working, and a whole lot of neon lights that had mostly burnt out decades — or centuries — before. The skylights let in the red glow of the Other’s sunless sky, but it was too weak to reflect off any of the shiny chrome fixtures. How it could look like something from forty-odd years ago on Earth when it was four hundred years in the Other was not something anyone was able to answer, aside from an unsatisfactory ‘time is weird here.’

The shops had all been turned into houses, or, well, shops for other stuff, that didn't take money or anything. Some made bullets, and others made or mended clothes, or garden equipment, or anything else the community might need — there was even a barbershop. It was a lot more like a big commune than a city; Marty would know, since she and Mama lived in one for a while, when she was alive.

The food court was the first thing you saw, right at the entrance, and funnily enough it still actually _was_ a food court. It was where a lot of the people ate, since the old store didn't have anything to cook with. It was more like a cafeteria now, with long wooden tables instead of the four-tops it used to have. A ship must have come by pretty recently, because she smelled oranges — oranges were so hard to grow, even in the greenhouses, that they weren’t considered worth the space or the effort. Everyone still needed Vitamin C, though, so supply ships would bring them when they came by, along with a whole lot of other stuff they’d never have otherwise.

It was only half-full right now, but it still echoed all the way to the skylight. Mama Tanya said all the skylights had steel shutters in case of an attack, but they still seemed pretty stupid to Marty, since steel wasn't as strong as stone. They were weak points in a place that couldn’t afford to have any. Someday the Edge would get too close, and the things that lived there would wipe the mall-city out. Maybe Mama Tanya would get more children.

The noise died down as people spotted her. The dead hardly ever came out this way, so they weren’t used to the sight of her or anyone like her. She gave them a little wave. “Is Chandra still in charge?”

“Er...yeah.” The speaker was a dark-skinned man so young he was barely more than a boy. “You’re from the Swamp?”

“Originally,” Marty said. “I’ve been on Earth for a while, and I’m looking for my mama. I don't know how to get where I want to be here from where I was there.”

For a moment, there was plain envy on the young man’s face. “I can take you to her,” he said at last. She could tell by his accent that he was one that had been born here, because the Other’s accent was like nothing found on Earth. “Should we be worried?”

“Probably not,” Marty said, padding after him. “No more than usual, anyway. Did you guys get a ship recently? One with stuff from Earth?” The Other had dragged most of its human population from Earth originally, but more came in all the time — usually children, because children weren’t tied so firmly to Earth. Some died, and went to Mama Tanya; others were found by grown-ups, and taken to places like New Echo (though most of those places were a lot smarter in how they designed their fortresses).

“Yeah,” he said. “Big one came and went. Dropped off stuff to all the communities.” There was bitterness in his tone. Sometimes — rarely — humans found a way back to Earth, but anyone born in the Other had to _stay_ in the Other. Even Jary and Mama Tanya couldn’t break that rule without Granddad’s help, so of course the humans were screwed from the word ‘go.’ (Mama Tanya said that, and Marty wasn't quite sure what it meant, but it sounded unpleasant.)

It wasn't all bad, though. The ones who got out had always tried to send stuff to the ones who were stuck — food, supplies, whatever — and now that the ships could come and go, that was a lot easier. Used to be they’d have to try to coordinate to meet up with a ship in the Other, which was kind of a bitch, since Time didn't run at the same speed in both worlds. Still, it had worked often enough to make it worth the effort and danger.

This young man let her through the crowd, up the wide, shallow stairs to the second level. The railings were smooth steel, and there were planters stuck to them every so often. They even had live plants with those full-spectrum lights, which she’d thought was a waste of resources until Mama Tanya pointed out that the Other’s air kind of sucked to breathe, so these made it nicer inside the city itself. Somebody had looked up what kind of plants made the most oxygen, and had even managed to get seeds from Earth.

The result was that some planters overflowed with ferns, while others had plants with long green leaves that Mama Tanya had called snake plants, even though they didn't look like snakes. Others had white lilies, and a rainbow spectrum of Gerbera daisies, with a big, potted palm tree here and there. They must make the air nicer or nobody would bother using up all that water, but it had been so long since Marty had breathed _any_ air that she didn't know just what difference it actually made. At least it was pretty, and she had a hazy memory that lilies smelled nice. They were pretty, too, especially the green vine that wound itself all along the railings, and crawled up trellises on the walls. It kind of offset the awful brown tile.

Neither of them spoke as they made their way through the crowded walkways, and the people they passed ooched out of the way with nervous eyes. There wasn't really anything she could do about that, though; she couldn't give any reassurance she didn't actually feel herself.

Eventually they reached what had probably once been a security office. Front and center was a big metal desk with a scratched wooden top, piled with notebooks — some were leather, but most were pasteboard and canvas so old the corners were blunt. There were shelves and shelves of them, and while Marty didn't know what they contained, she was pretty sure it had to be boring lists or whatever. Grown-up stuff could be so mind-numbingly dull that she was glad she’d never grow up herself.

The woman currently in charge was still pretty young — most people here were, since the living generally didn't managed to live to old age in the Other. Her parents had both been pulled in from India in different decades, and while her dad had died when she was a baby, her mama was one of the people that came and went between here and Earth, making sure the city had everything it needed that it couldn't make itself. Chandra had Uncle Ratiri’s dark skin and really shiny black hair, and eyes so dark a brown they almost looked black themselves. She didn't look terribly happy to see Marty, either, but most people didn't.

“I just need to call Mama,” Marty said. “I won’t be in your hair for long. I dunno if she’s in the Swamp, with Granddad, or up with Jary, but she’s gotta be in one of those places.”

Chandra’s eyes widened. The poor guy who’d brought her here looked clueless, but Chandra looked like she’d twigged to who Marty actually was in about two seconds flat. “Marty, why are you here?”

“’Cause this is where I landed when I crossed,” the girl said. “I dunno how to go exactly where I want to yet. Stuff’s going on back on Earth, and we need to drag Mama home. Nobody can get in or outta the DMA on that side, but Mama can — and she can find out who fucked it up in the first place.”

Chandra massaged her temples. “Okay,” she said. “We’ll get your mom, and hope she gets here soon.”

 

~

 

The _O.S. Nezhiti_ had pushed itself almost past the point of structural integrity to get to Moshi, for it had been very far to the south when the volcano erupted. This rescue mission might be suicide, but since most of the crew were already dead, they hardly cared.

A blizzard of ash scoured the deck, but it didn't bother the crew, since they didn't need to breathe. In very short order they had something of a chain going: the rows of lifeboats were lowered in a staggered pattern, so that the first was unloaded onto the deck just as the last was filled. Living crew in respirators sorted the wounded with brisk efficiency, and shuttled them down into safety belowdecks. Considering each lifeboat was roughly the size of your average fishing trawler, the system could yank hundreds of people at one go.

The problem was that there were thousands trapped below — something made all too evident by the lightning that flashed within the ash cloud. The ship had to focus on the wounded, the old, the children — those least likely to be able to hoof it under their own steam. The strong and healthy, unfortunately, were going to have to make it on their own, unless they had Gifts like healing, or aura-manipulation, or anything that might be useful with the injured.

“What’s going on with the traffic down there?” The First Mate was an actual live adult, her voice muffled by her respirator. Ash had already coated her, so that she looked like some kind of grey snowman.

“It looks like cars that had hurt people are trying to pull off the road.” Angela Ramirez (who’d gone to the Other in 1977, and probably had her heart ripped out by some kind of insane tree... _thing_ ) peered down over the railing. “The not-hurt people are kind of jamming into the ones that had the hurt people in them.” It was honestly pretty difficult to see from this distance, especially with all the ash, but for whatever, reason, the zombies all had keener vision than live humans. Mama Tanya said it was probably to make up for the fact that most of their other senses went to hell when they died.

“Shit, I hope that does some kind of good,” the First Mate muttered. In theory it would mean less traffic, but it wasn't like panicked people were known for rationality. Just how many were going to die down there? It wasn't a thought they could let themselves have. Damn but it was hot; she was sweating even in her relatively light layers, and the other living crew had to be having it just as bad.

Lightning forked through billowing ash clouds in veins of silver, and Angela wondered uneasily if they would strike the ship. Sure, they were technically able to handle something like that — Captain Jary designed and built them, after all —  but it wasn't something that had ever actually been tested. For all the Other could have some massive storms, lightning was actually pretty rare, and the ship might as well be one giant lightning-rod.

A gust of wind buffeted them, oven-hot and desert-dry, scouring ship and crew with ash and pumice. The ship itself was too big to be disturbed at anchor, but the lifeboats were definitely not. More than a little terrified screaming traveled up from below, as the boats rocked on their lines and the field of visibility went utterly to hell. Something had been shielding them from the worst of it, and that something had obviously either given up or failed. _Fuck_. The ash would gum up the pulleys at this rate, and then what the hell would they do?

 _Keep going,_ she thought. _Let the captain worry._ Captain Louisa knew what she was doing, at least most of the time; she’d sailed under Captain Jary until she got too old to be on the _Life Boat_. Still, Earth was Earth and the Other was the Other, and the last time Captain Louisa had been on Earth had been 1886. She was still learning a whole lot about her own world, so her judgement wasn't always...perfect.

But it wasn't like they had much choice now. The pulleys squeaked as they were hauled, pumice ground powder-fine within the mechanism. Shit, that was going to be a problem in a big fat hurry. _Keep going_ , she thought. _Keep going._

 

~

 

Ratiri and Mick were utterly shameless about loading their invalid patients into a boat before anyone else got the chance. There was plenty of room, after all; at first, they actually had to hunt for enough people to fill the boats. The injured, the elderly and children who couldn’t handle the heat, hunched over and coughing through their inefficient attempts at masks — they were loaded in, guided by crew who knew just how much weight the lines could take.

 _Oh, let this work,_ Ratiri thought, even as he guided a woman out of an overcrowded Jeep. She had a screaming infant cracdled against her body, with both wrapped up in her headscarf.

“Hold her like this,” he said, and draped the scarf more loosely. “She needs more room to breathe. It’s a good thing she’s crying — if she’s crying, she’s got enough air and energy.”

The poor woman could only nod at him, and try to keep the ash from her eyes as he helped her into the boat. If she got that child inside, they ought to be all right. He had no idea just how big this ship was, but the silhouette cast by the lightning made him suspect it might rival the size of urban Moshi. It just had to hold as long as it could.

He really, really needed to find Lorna, but he was also needed here; he couldn't abandon these people to hunt for his wife, but if he didn't do it, who would? Pat and Siobhan were long gone, and these people were Mick’s patients. That left only Ratiri, but not yet. Not while there were still so many on the ground. A tendril of hope had somehow unfurled in his heart, but he dared not let it grow just yet.

Three children — the youngest no older than six, the eldest no more than eleven — all but ran into him. Their tears had left tracks through the ash on their faces, and the only thing they had covering their mouths and noses was the collar of their shirts. Hitching sobs mingled with harsh coughs, and the eldest girl cried, over and over, for her parents. Shit.

Normally, Ratiri liked to be more delicate in his dealings with auras, but this was the equivalent of meatball surgery. He yanked out as much of the carmine fear as he could, and knelt in front of them. “You need to go on the ship,” he said. “Get in that boat there and you’ll be safe.”

“Mama,” the poor girl said. Her voice was so thick with tears he could scarcely understand her. “Father.”

“If they’re out here, we’ll find them,” he said, and hoped to hell he hadn't just told the girl a bald-faced lie. “They would want you safe. What’s your name?”

The girl blinked hard, and wiped the ash from her eyes. “Leyla.”

“All right, Leyla, my name is Ratiri, and let me tell you something: knowing my children are safe away from this is what keeps me going. If they were here with me, I’d want them on that ship, and I know your parents would want you there, too. You three, you get in this boat, and you go down inside that ship, okay? You can breathe in there, and you just stick together until we find your parents.”

Thank the Lady, she actually did as she was told. The trio huddled against the side, beside the woman with the baby and a young man who had, until a moment ago, been laid out on a gurney. Ratiri didn't breathe until that boat was loaded and winched upward.

A rough hand on his shoulder brought him back to himself. “Ratiri, you’ve got to go find Lorna.” Sweat and ash had turned Mick into a golem-like figure, but his hazel eyes were bright with fervor and, Ratiri feared, incipient heatsickness. “I’ve got this, and you know as well as I do she’s probably knocked herself out fighting the bloody volcano. Go get her and stick her on this ship.”

Ratiri only hesitated for a moment before he nodded, because Mick was right: when he tried to tap his mental link to Lorna, there came no response. He could still use it as a homing-beacon, however, so off he went; snatching an abandoned bicycle along the way. Christ it was hot, hotter even than the brief stint he’d done in Mexico during the War, and whatever else he’d inherited from his mother, heat tolerance was not among it. He had his Scottish father’s love of mists and chill, and the ash was no substitute for a misty moore.

 _She’s alive_ , he told himself, as he wove through the burgeoning crowd. More than one person looked at him like he was utterly mad, to be going in the opposite direction of that ship, but he had neither the time nor the breath to explain. Yes, Lorna was as alive as she was unconscious, and he could only pray she wasn't going to be buried under so much ash he didn't find her until he ran her over. She would not, he knew, thank him for that.

Somehow, the air shifted, and once again the ash lightened a fraction. This time he knew it wasn't Lorna’s doing, but he couldn’t summon the energy to wonder just what it was. At this point, he didn't think it mattered. The pumice that struck his face was of more immediate concern; light though it was, it was nearly hot enough to burn.

_Keep breathing, Lorna. Keep breathing. If I have to follow you into that pale forest and drag you back out like a Neanderthal, I will. Just watch me._

In the end, finding her wasn't nearly as difficult as he’d feared. She sat slumped against a rock, so plastered with ash she looked like a statue, but there she was, and there she breathed. She was going to hate absolutely everything later, but at least she’d be alive to hate it.

Ratiri knew his odds of getting her back by bike were about as long as the Nile, but he tried anyway, balancing her as best he could. His progress wobbled, and he often had to course-correct with his feet, but at least it was marginally faster than walking. Lorna’s heart beat against his, and even through her mask her breath was warm and even on his skin. All he could do was hope to hell there would still be boats when he found the ship again.

Bless the crowd, they took one look at Lorna and let him through along with the other wounded, granting her the same priority as the rest of the injured. He had to trust that someone would get her into a nice safe spot, where she could be unconscious as long as she liked.

His heart eased when that boat went up, as though the weight of dread that pressed upon it had lifted halfway. The twins were safe, and now Lorna was, too. He could keep on down here without being half paralyzed with terror.

 

~

 

Siobhan hadn't got far before her van’s engine fatally choked on the ash. Fortunately, that blessed ship had showed up before she could panic.

“All right, you lot, everybody out,” she ordered. “Any’v you that can’t walk, you just lean on those that can. We haven’t got to go that far.” The ship’s great lifeboats stood out in stark shadow when the lightning flared; she could get this group on it and then stop worrying. She was so exhausted she could barely think straight, but she _could_ put one foot in front of the other, while supporting the weight of an old woman only a touch taller than she was. It was slow going, like marching through a grey, scorching blizzard, but step by grim step, they somehow made it. Bloody good thing, too, because her consciousness chose that moment to fuzz to grey, and her adrenaline and leaden limbs finally combined to say, ‘fuck you’.

A dim, hazy bit of awareness remained as she hit the ground (and took the poor old woman with her), but it wasn't enough to actually register pain. She was peripherally aware of Eris screaming for her, and she managed to somewhat register it when several pairs of hands managed to manhandle her onto one of the boats, but that was as much as she could do before her mind said ‘nope’ and terminated her consciousness entirely.

Eris, worn and terrified, somehow managed to get all their passengers into the boat. She knew that as an uninjured person, she really ought to get out, but somebody shoved her right back in when she tried, and she didn't have the energy to fight it. Evidently she looked even worse than she felt, which was really saying something; she fell backward, and smacked the back of her head on someone’s elbow. Her lungs burned with every breath she took, but at least she was breathing.

The boat swayed in the wind as it rose, and it obviously terrified most of the people around her, but Eris was just too tired to summon any more fear than was already coursing through her veins. Once she’d got everyone inside and out of this ash-storm, she’d let herself pass out.

Somehow, the ash wasn't as bad up here, though she’d have thought it would be the opposite. Crew ran to and from with brooms, sweeping the pumice off the deck, though she didn't know why the hell they bothered. Her own weary feet, heavy as stones, trudged into the herd of people that had bottlenecked at the doors that led below. How many could this ship hold? Eris had never actually been aboard one before, but she’d heard stories about their seemingly impossible size. However Jary did it, she made things that cheerfully gave the square/cube law the finger with both hands.

There was no point in someone Eris’s height trying to shove her way anywhere, so she just let herself be borne along by the crowd, while lightning flash and thunder growled, and the ash fell on and on. Only once inside did she pull the ash-logged scarf off her face, and drew a deep breath of air that might not be fresh, but at least was clean.

The ship’s corridors were surprisingly wide, and fortunately well-lit. A handful of little zombie crew directed the human traffic with an ease that suggested they’d done it before, and more than once. At least Eris managed to stick with her mam when they were shunted to the left. Their group more or less flowed like a river into the mess hall, where a load of wounded were already laid out on the tables. Somebody managed to find a place for Mam, and Eris, like a child, curled up on the bench beside her. Such was her exhaustion that the last thing she was aware of was the feel of her mother’s hand in hers.

 

~

 

Julifer had been mainlining caffeine like a trucker with a sexy wife and two days’ drive to get home, but at least she’d had the sense to stop when her hands started shaking. There _was_ a bug in the system, though she had no fucking idea how it had got there, past all their security.

She’d found it two hours ago, but could she isolate it? Of course not. Did she even know for sure what it was? Of course not. At least the techies that had been cleared by Gavin were just as stumped as she was. That shouldn’t make her feel better, given how dire the situation was, but it kind of did. She felt marginally less inept.

“Julifer, we got a C2-77.” Geezer’s voice was weary through her earpiece, and she didn't blame him, though her heart sank. Since there was no guarantee of privacy even on the supposedly secret bands, they were reduced to the backup codes Miranda had made before she died. Exactly five people knew them, and two of them were in Africa, probably watching TV and trying not to piss their pants. C2-77 meant telepathy — Gavin must have found something, and Julifer wasn't sure if she ought to be relieved, terrified, or pissed.

“On it,” she said, and shut her laptop. “You guys lock that door and don't let anybody in.”

The five techies gave her expressions of blatant alarm, but she didn't have time to argue with them. “I mean it. I don't care if it’s your sister on the other side, you keep this door locked.” She was out said door before any of them could think to argue.

The corridors were so empty it was downright eerie, and her stupid brain couldn’t help but cough up memory of every zombie movie she’d ever seen. The sickly lights of the Yellow Alert still flashed and dimmed with their own slow pulse, but the alarm itself was much quieter. Awful as it was, she found herself wishing she had a weapon of some kind, though she’d hardly know what to do with one if she did.

Gavin had set up shop in the nearest cafeteria: he and the telepaths he’d cleared had had a pretty brisk line going, tired though they all were. It was one that had got stuck at some point in the 1970’s when Sharley rebuilt the DMA’s Time, and as such had some ungodly Paisley wallpaper and an unfortunate amount of avocado green. Apparently the staff had decided to run with it, because in addition to the ceiling lights, an assortment of lava lamps were scattered about the tables. It was kind of hard to take anything seriously in this environment, but at least it wasn't the neon 80’s monstrosity a bit further down. Paisley merely hurt the eyeballs; neon seared them.

All the fucking tables were either avocado green or mustard yellow, but at least the ones currently in use were papered over with tea-ringed checklists. It smelled like boiled tea and booze, and the latter scent made her frown, because who was stupid enough to be drinking at a time like this? Gavin and Geezer weren’t, and their ten other telepaths just looked tired, not drunk. There was one person whose state she couldn't have guessed, but that was just because he was dead. Super, super obviously dead, sprawled out on the tile floor like a scarecrow.

Julifer approached him, staring. It was nobody she recognized, not that that meant anything. His age was hard to guess — he could have been anywhere from thirty to fifty, because while his face had few lines, his shaggy hair was almost totally grey. Bushy eyebrows, skin the kind of pale that was only brought about by spending your life totally inside…there was some kind of foam bubbling out of his lips, too.

“What in the _shit_?” she asked. “I thought you had a C2-77. What happened to this guy?”

“Oh, we do,” Gavin said, and yanked a second, obviously terrified man off the ground. He was young and weedy, and he’d been tied up with rope made out of his own shirt, and looked about two seconds away from peeing himself — but then, an angry Gavin would make most people’s bladders loosen. “Geezer stopped this asshole before he managed what that one did.”

“Cyanide capsule,” Geezer said, pointing at the dead guy. “You see ’em in the movies, but what most people don't know is that cyanide doesn’t kill instantly. That shithead choked on his own tongue as much as anything else.”

“How’d you get the other one to spit it out?” Julifer asked. No matter how many dead people she saw in her life, they never got any less unsettling.

“Punched him in the stomach,” Gavin said, with a humorless grin. “Man’ll spit out anything if you slug him in the breadbasket.”

Julifer should not have laughed, but a somewhat hysterical giggle burst out of her nonetheless. “So who the hell are they?”

Nobody answered right off, so Gavin gave his prisoner a shake so hard the poor bastard’s teeth clacked together. “Go on, man,” Gavin said, in a deceptively conversational tone. “Tell the lady why you’re here. You don't want me to do it for you.”

Something in the bastard seem to rally, for he stood up as straight as he actually could. “We’re finishing it,” he said, though his voice trembled a little.

“Finishing _what_?” Gavin prompted, and gave him another shake.

“What the Doctor started. What Doctor von Rached tried to do.”

Julifer stared, rather helplessly. Seriously? _Seriously?_ She’d thought the Von Rached groupies were bad enough, but at least they were harmless, if seriously gross. Von Rached wannabes were a new one. “Oh, fuck _me_ ,” she growled. “Gavin, you have my express permission to dig through his head like a Cracker Jack box — you go as far as you feel you ethically can, okay? _I_ don't care if you turn his brain into oatmeal.”

It was a mark of just how angry Gavin had to be, that he didn't look at all perturbed by the idea. She had no doubt at all that he’d punish himself for it later, and she and Geezer would just have to do what they could for him. Sometimes, a person had to do what a person had to do, however much it sucked for them.

“I shouldn’t say this, but it’d be my pleasure,” he said, with a slow, downright diabolical grin at his prisoner. “You wanna show me what I wanna know, or should I get the mental backhoe?”

“I think that’s piss I smell,” Geezer said, “and it ain’t mine.” And sure enough, there was a dark stain spreading down their prisoner’s leg.

“Oops,” Gavin said.


	6. Chapter Six

In spite of his anger, Gavin could not call what followed any fun at all. His ethics, though strained as hell by the last day and a half, still existed, and they pricked at his mind even as he sat the little (pissy) pissant on a chair, and let a fellow telekinetic, Sheila Ivarsdottír, effectively nail him in place.

“All right...Kyle,” Gavin said, “you want to make this easy on both of us. I’m not gonna like this any more than you, but that don't mean I won’t do it.” He hated the look in the kid’s eyes — fear, sure, because he wasn't _totally_ stupid, but also a watery kind of defiance, laid over a genuine conviction that he believed in what he was doing.

Well, fuck. This really _was_ going to suck. And not just because the kid was marinating in his own piss.

“We’re finishing his work,” Kyle said, and swallowed hard. “He wanted to destroy you. You _did_ get destroyed, but then fucking Sharley brought it back.” He glanced around. “Sort of.”

Gavin sighed, and scrubbed a hand over his face. “There any point in me trying to get honest answers outta you? How many of you there are, where you’re at — that kinda thing?”

Kyle’s expression told him the answer to that was a resounding ‘no’.

“All right, man, but you can’t say I didn't warn you.”

_Gavin was as careful as he could be, because it was how he’d been trained. Given the strength of his Gift, Lorna had tutored him personally well before she started training others, and he’d had three years now to hone what she’d taught him._

_Nobody’s mental landscape was quite like another’s, and he wasn't totally surprised to find Kyle’s looked like something out of one of those videogames Gavin had been too destitute to touch, let alone play when he was Kyle’s age. Nice graphics, at least._

_The kid’s mind wasn't very orderly, which didn't help anything. He had no neat compartments for work or leisure, wants or needs. What he_ did _have was an overwhelming belief not just in his superiority, but of the rightness and nobility of his cause. Jesus, he’d been what, sixteen during the War? What the hell did he know of Von Rached, or anything to do with him? That dumbass book didn't actually give a whole lot of information about the man himself, or just what his goals might have really been._

_Gavin made his way down a CGI street peopled with equally CGI humans, none of whom spared a glance at him. The kid was a nerd; somewhere in here would be a file room, even if it was probably going to be a jumbled mess. Kyle didn't belong to the group of people that kept anything except their electronics neat and tidy; if he had a bedroom somewhere, it was probably a disaster that smelled like socks that hadn't been washed in a month._

_All throughout his walk, he could feel Kyle fighting him with a desperation that turned his stomach. God dammit, he_ did not _want to have to do this — it was so far beyond wrong that it screamed across his instincts like rusty piano wire, and the revulsion that filled him was not merely because this kid was so repulsive. He wanted a drink later — fuck, he wanted a bottle._

_Finally, after what seemed an age, he found it. It looked pretty damn out-of-place among this Uncanny Valley landscape: it was an 8-bit monstrosity that somebody a lot older than Kyle would have ever played. In Gavin went, and sighed. Sometimes he hated being right._

_There were in fact files...spread all over the floor, their contents a jumble. With a groan, he knelt, and flipped through a few at random. Of course there was nothing of any actual use — hell, half the pages were blank, which would have made him laugh if the situation wasn't so desperate._

_One of them_ finally _triggered a memory worth watching: why the fuck he’d wanted to join these lunatics in the first place._

_“You’re eighteen, Kyle. It’s time you got a job, since you think school’s for losers.”_

_The voice belonged to Kyle’s aunt, and it was an annoyance he never had managed to totally tune out. What did he need school for? He was a technopath, and tech was what really mattered. “I’m looking for one,” he called, as he stared up at the ceiling. It had stick-on glow-in-the-dark stars that had been there since he was eight years old, before the War — before his parents died. Someday he’d take them down, because only little kids had anything that childish._

_Someday._

_Aunt Sandra stood in the doorway, and the hallway light cast her shadow long across the Category Three disaster that was his bedroom. There were still a few bits of carpet visible, so he didn't have to worry yet. “No you’re not,” she sighed. She was a big woman, with frizzy red hair and a face that normally defaulted to kindness. Not now, however. “Yeah, you’re looking so hard,” she deadpanned. “You’re not going to get what you want with no GED, no matter how good you are with your Gift.”_

_“Why the fuck not?” he said — and no, he did not whine. Of course not. “If I’ve got the talent, what does the rest matter?”_

_“Talent’s only half the equation, Kyle,” Aunt Sandra said. “They want to know if you’ve got the self-discipline to stick it out when things get hard. And if you can’t even be bothered to get off your ass and get a GED, that looks bad. Really bad. Just be glad public school isn’t the waste of time it was when I was your age, and go apply at the supermarket.”_

_Kyle rolled his eyes. He had to get out of this fucking house, away from Aunt Sandra and these stick-on stars. He didn't need any damn job bagging groceries, he needed to_ do _something — something worth his time and talent. The DMA had such a damn stranglehold on technopaths that it was hard to get a legit job without going through them, so maybe he needed a non-legit one._

_Or, you know, maybe the DMA needed to go._

_It hadn't protected his parents, in the end. They’d been in the DMA when the Memories breached the northern Doors, and the terrified crowds of would-be evacuees stampeded for the southern exits. Kyle had gotten separated from his parents in the surge, and the last thing he’d heard was his mother screaming his name._

_He never knew if the Memories got them, or if they just got separated and shoved out different Doors. He’d looked for them, on the net and off it; there were whole servers dedicated to finding lost family members, but he’d found nothing. He couldn’t even be sure they actually_ were _dead, which was the worst part. If they were, they were buried somewhere far away, in unmarked graves. He might never know, either way._

 _The DMA had said they’d be safe. The DMA had lied. Maybe the DMA really_ did _need to go...and he was pretty sure he knew people who already thought the same._

_The net was pretty different than it had been when he was a kid, just because it was built and managed almost totally by technopaths. It made getting away with shenanigans a lot harder, but it wasn't impossible to make a private, unmonitored server — it was just really hard to keep it that way. He’d trawled a lot of those he’d found, though he rarely interacted. Most of those people were just too fucking weird, but at least they weren’t boring._

_Last night he’d found the weirdest of the goddamn bunch, though ‘found’ wasn't quite right — his friend Davey had invited him in. Kyle knew Davey was a closet Von Rached fanboy — there were a lot of them out there — but he hadn't had any idea it ran_ this _deep. The server wasn't a rolling one, it was an actual, dedicated thing that was just begging for some DMA person to find it and hunt them all down...because some of them were nuts._

 _Fanboys, Kyle had known about. Nobody with a brain did it openly, but there were weirdos who’d look up to anyone powerful enough and strong enough to take what they wanted, and fuck the consequences. What he hadn't expected were the people who wanted to actually be the man, and_ definitely _not the number of people who wanted to screw him...or his corpse, which, gross. The server had given Kyle the utter heebie-jeebies, until he ran across one group who were pondering something he could actually get behind: taking out the DMA. Finishing what Von Rached started._

_That. That he could do. That, he’d get out of bed for._

_Gavin sat back, sickened. The techies tracked the net, sure, but he wasn't surprised something like that would sneak under their radar — in spite of their best efforts, there were probably hundreds more like it._

_Something Lorna had said now surfaced within his own mind: “No matter how pissed you are at somebody, hardly anyone’s all evil,” she said, as they sat beside a campfire on a clear summer night. “The deeper you go into someone’s mind, the more obvious that is. Humans aren’t angels or demons, Gavin — we’re somewhere in the middle, and there’s not many out there that’ll do something evil for shits and giggles. There’s almost always a reason, even if it’s a piss-poor one.”_

_He wished he wasn't so aware of that now._

Jesus, kid, _he thought. This was going to suck even worse than he’d expected._

 

~

 

Pat managed to make it to Arusha before the bus’s engine gave up, but barely. This far out, the ash wasn't nearly so heavy, but ash there was. It screened the sun into a hellish red eye that glared down at them as they evacuated to the shelter of corner shop.

The town was a scene of growing chaos, but the shop owner ushered them all inside. For now, the town still had electricity, which meant air conditioning, which felt outright heavenly after the stifling, sweltering heat of the bus.

Given the number of people who’d taken shelter inside, it was eerily quiet; the only real sound came from the elderly shop owner, who distributed packets of biscuits to the children like some sweet-bearing fairy godmother.

“You are from Moshi?” she asked, of everyone and no one.

Pat swallowed. HIs throat was as dry as the ash outside, and when he spoke, his voice was a rasp. “We have,” he said. “We were some’v the first out, but there’s loads behind us, if their engines don't choke first. A ship’s gone that way, but Christ knows how many it can grab.”

 _“Mam and Da are out there,”_ Mairead said, with an eerie solemnity that only her family would recognize as her desperate attempt to keep her shit together. She and Jerry each had hold of one of Eris’s twins, who looked like dolls beside them. _“Lots of people’s parents. My uncle just sort’v tossed us all in and said ‘go’, so we went.”_ She would have seemed creepily detached, if not for the naked terror in her pale eyes.

With a wince, Pat sat, and somehow gathered the lot of them onto his lap. It took a bit of doing, because although they were all tiny, he wasn't exactly a large man himself. “Here now,” he said, as he wiped a teary Donna’s face with the tail of his T-shirt, “we’re safe enough here, and once the DMA’s got its shite together, all’v us and all these people can get somewhere that’s not snowing ash. I’ll get you home, where the air’s clean and there’s cats.”

 _‘What about Mam and Da, and Uncle Mick and Aunt Siobhan and Eris?”_ Jerry asked. His tears had yet to spill over, but his eyes shone with them, so it was only a matter of time.

“They’re Donovans,” Pat said firmly, “and your da’s one by marriage, no matter what his second name might be.” It wasn't actually an answer, but it was the best he had.

He glanced up at Saida, who was grey with fear. A grizzling James was on her hip, while Zhara clung to her leg. “Saida, you lot’re coming with us,” he said firmly. “Between all the Donovans, we’ve got loads’v spare rooms.”

The relief in the poor woman’s eyes was faint, but it was there. “When we get to the DMA.”

“When we get to the DMA,” he echoed, and sighed. “I wouldn’t want to be Julifer right now — no, scratch that. I wouldn’t want to be in Julifer’s _way._ ” Gavin might be the naturally intimidating one, but Julifer was the sort of bantam-weight bastard who ambushed you like a snake.

The sky outside darkened, and a shudder ran around the room like a palpable wave. “How long will it be?” Saida asked, and her voice was little more than a whisper.

“About as long as it takes for them to find whoever fucked up, and terrorize them into fixing it,” he said, and quite deliberately left out any possibility of terrorism. “We’re all right here, Saida. We’ve just got to stay put, and let that ship do its thing. I couldn’t rightly see the color through all that ash, but I think it’s the _Nezhiti_ — that one’s got a load’v zombie crew who don't need to breathe this crap.” Christ did he wish he could do what Lorna did, or Mick and Ratiri. As it was, he could only offer words of comfort even he didn't fully believe.

Ash hazed the windows and glass doors, but outside, the foot traffic swelled as car after car died. At least most managed to coast to the side of the road, more or less. It meant they could avoid total gridlock...for now.

 _Lady, if you’re listening, we could really use a hand right now,_ he thought. _Or any volcano deities that might be around and awake._ To this day, nobody but Sharley knew how many of the old gods were awake, and how many had gone off for a nap — and Sharley wasn't telling. She was adamant about it in a way she was about very few things, so nobody pressed her about it.

“Da,” Saoirse said slowly, “you and me could do something. About that, I mean.” Her nose was pressed against the glass. “Those trees that look like umbrellas over the street — you could make them...thicker, right? So they’re like a tunnel the ash couldn’t get through? And I could try to throw some wind at the ash, so it gets higher up? It’ll go further if I do, but it’ll be lighter.”

It sounded utterly ridiculous, but Pat could not categorically say she was wrong. “Saoirse, allanah, it’s not safe out there. We’re best off in here.”

“But _they’re_ out there,” she said, her eyes still glued to the traffic, “and they can’t all fit in here, so we can’t just sit on our asses, can we? I mean, you’re saying we’re Donovans, but we’re Donovans who aren’t doing shit right now.”

Pat wished she didn't have a point. He really, really did. Christ, the rest of his siblings were out giving their Donovan all, and while the kids were his responsibility, he couldn't justify sitting in here when he could be doing something out there. He also knew that there was less than no point in expecting his daughter to stay put — oh he could tell her, but she’d just sneak out as soon as his back was turned, because she was a bloody Donovan.

“Fifteen minutes,” he said. “Saida, you look after both sets’v twins, all right? Saoirse and I are going out for fifteen minutes. Mairead, Jerry, you keep hold’v Donna and Sam or I’ll get skinned by all my siblings. They’ll have to take it in turns.”

Four pairs of pale eyes stared at him, and for small heads nodded with a synchrony that was beyond creepy. Pat fixed a bandanna over Saoirse’s mouth and nose, and tied one on himself. This was a totally shit idea, and yet they were doing it anyway.

Out they plunged, into a storm surge of humanity. Not being entirely stupid, he picked up his daughter before they could get separated in the mayhem. By now the road outside of town was completely clogged with dead vehicles, so at least they could safely make their way to the center of the street. They might well have wandered out into an oven, and the drone of car horns was like the distant anger of swarming bees, ringing hollow in his ears over the thunder-drumming of his own pulse.

Humanity might fear the volcano, but the trees hardly cared. Heat meant nothing to them, and just yet the ash didn't, either. They were already somewhat screening it from the road beneath them, but too much was making its way through. It had settled into little mounds and drifts on the street.

What did he have to work with? Not nearly enough water, for a start, but if the roots were really determined, they’d find some. He just hoped they wouldn’t burst any mains in doing it.

Above the canopy, the ash lightened a fraction. Light wind stirred his sweaty hair, and not from the direction of the mountain. He didn't need to glance at his daughter’s intent little face to know whose doing it was. Saoirse could have so little control over her Gift at the best of times, but at this point, she probably couldn’t make things worse. They were dealing with a fucking volcano; the only thing that could make it worse was itself.

 _Focus, God dammit._ Even yet, Pat couldn’t describe just what his Gift felt like, or even fully how he did it. The magic was always there, simmering at the back of his mind, and there were times he felt like it was using him as much as he was using it. He released it with intent, and by now it was usually willing to do what he wanted. Usually.

It did so now, and with a vengeance, pouring from someplace between mind and soul. For whatever reason, Donovans were all abnormally powerful, that seemed to run in families, though no one knew why, but right now he’d take what he could get.

Chloropaths didn't actually talk to plants, no matter what others might think (or at least, no more so than anyone might do if swearing at a weed that wouldn’t pull). What they _did_ was channel their Gift into massive surges of energy that poured into their target, with all the subtlety of a brick — the trick wasn't using it so much as directing it. Plants wanted to grow; shoot them full of enough nutrients and energy and they’d go nuts. They were basically programmed to use everything they were given.

Pat sure as hell gave now, but he was totally unfamiliar with acacia trees, and at first he had a fuck of a time controlling them. Roots heaved both street and footpaths until, half panicked, he funneled his magic upward, up into the boughs.

Naturally, they went utterly mental. The idea of trying to direct their growth was laughable, so he didn't, but he didn't have to. They closed into a solid mass on their own, catching and twining like snakes, until their needles were so thick that no more ash reached the street. Down the street it went, into a long, shadowy arch.

A surge of elation passed through him, but it didn't last; it was four kilometers to the Door, and God bloody knew how far beyond that. There was no way in hell he could keep this up for that distance, even if he hadn't promised to go back to the shop after fifteen minutes. He was sure already that they’d passed that mark.

The refugees scuttled faster once they saw there was some form of shelter, however crude. Sweating, gasping through their impromptu masks, they trembled beneath the roof of boughs. “Are any’v you chloropaths?” he called. “Anybody? Only I can’t do all this on my own.” He wasn't holding his breath; chloropathy was quite a common Gift now, but the overwhelming majority of chloropaths were small children who’d been born with it.

Unsurprisingly, he found no aid. “Get inside,” he said. “There’s still power, for now, but even where there’s not, you’ll be somewhere you can actually breathe. Just try to shake the ash off before you go in.”

He and Saoirse legged it back to the shop, and at least he could tell himself he’d done _something_ . Once the children were placated, he could do something more, until his energy flagged. He might not be a healer, but that didn't mean he needed to sit idly by. If there was one thing a Donovan _didn't_ do, it was sit on their arse when things went to shit.

 

~

 

Gavin had thought Kyle’s mind was bad, but his next living buddy’s was even worse.

Kyle at least had a motive that was understandable, if horribly misguided. This other dude, however, was such a straight-up asshole that Gavin didn't feel much guilt about being...somewhat less than careful in his head.

The bastard’s name was Alex, and he was a good ten years older than Kyle. He hadn't lost anybody in the War because he hadn't had anybody to begin with — not that he’d cared. He’d been a purposeless dumbass before the War, but now he saw himself as some sort of...acolyte, who needed to carry on the work of a dead man for no real reason other than, _I want to._

The fucker sat still enough now, his grey face sheened with sweat, eyes glassy. He’d tried to put up a fight, and that was the weird thing: he wasn't a weak telepath. He could have had a job at the DMA, but his mind was permeated with a rage that he was not stronger — that he wasn't Von Rached.

Gross.

Gavin honestly didn't know what to do with him, other than leave him in a cell to rot. Kyle might be redeemable, but Alex didn't have anything to redeem in the first place.

 _Not your decision_ , he thought, and was somewhat ashamed by the sheer volume of his relief.

“You don't understand,” Alex whispered. “You really don't get it at all.”

“Nope,” Gavin said flatly, as he rose. “And I don't want to. All I know is, you threw your life away for a dead man who woulda tossed you away without a second thought. And you got a long time to think about that.”

He left before the prick could respond. His head hurt, and his mind felt...greasy. Nasty. Booze wasn't an option, but he’d settle for some water and a few Tylenol. If he was really lucky, a nap might be somewhere in the cards. He was just too damn old for this shit.

 _Geezer’s like twice your age, at least._ It was a nasty thought, and not one Gavin needed, so he shoved it aside. He wasn't the only one who suspected Geezer might actually be the Highlander, and just didn't remember it.

Julifer was still in the makeshift office, along with her gang of techies. None of them so much as looked up when he went in, and he managed to get a cup of water out of the cooler without being accosted. He’d always had a lot of respect for Katje, but now he wondered just how the hell she managed this circus. True, terrorist attacks didn't exactly happen every day, but still.

The cold water was a blessing to his throat, and fortunately there was actually an assortment of painkillers available. He found a bottle labeled ‘tension headache’ and went with it.

“Is it bad?” Julifer called.

He sighed heavily, and sank into a chair. “That’s one word for it. I don't know which is worse, the ones who think they’re doing something good, or the ones who want to be doing something bad. Von Rached really is the fucking gift that keeps on giving, and we can’t even hit him for it. Wish I knew where he was buried, so I could go take a piss on his grave.”

A fit of giggles burst out of one of the techies, and he was glad _somebody_ could laugh. “You’d probably have to go to the Arctic,” she said. “I mean, that’s where he died.”

“No thanks.” Gavin’s L.A.-born-and-bred soul had a hard enough time with winter on the mountain, let alone the North Pole. “Any luck yet?”

“Of course not,” Julifer sighed. “That would be too easy.” She ran a hand through her hair, which was already a mess. “You realize what this means, right? There’s no damn way this is a totally outside job. They have to have at least one person on the inside, and how the hell did _that_ happen? How’d somebody get past the telepath screening?”

Gavin stared at her. “Fuck, there’s a thought I didn't need.” If there was one mole, there were probably more. “Except...hell, I don't even want to say this, but maybe whoever they got in the inside didn't start off like...that. Maybe it’s somebody like the Kyle kid, who got turned somewhere along the way.” Which was an even _worse_ thought, but it made all too much sense. The idea that anyone who’d lived in the DMA deciding to destroy it was not one he could fathom, but people were people, and some of them sucked — it just took them longer to show it than others.

A sharp intake of breath caught his attention — the young techie who’d giggled stared wide-eyed at her laptop, and color sprang into her earth-toned skin. “Holy shit,” she said. “Holy shit, Julifer, I think I’ve fucking got it.”

Julifer leapt to her feet, but which was downright comical was that the rest of them did, too, and crowded around her. She had a big head of natural hair that some of them had to actually duck under. “What am I looking at?” Julifer asked.

“It’s a worm,” the techie said. “And it’s a bitch of a worm, too — no wonder it took us so long to find it. It looks like the code shifts every time it finds a new system to infect, but the fucking pattern’s not as random as whoever made it thinks it is. We can isolate it at it goes, though I’ve got to warn you, we might fuck up some of our own programs in the process.”

“Could we actually do any worse damage than that thing’s doing?” Julifer asked.

“Probably not, but I can’t promise that. Look, at least if we fuck it up ourselves, we can fix it.”

Julifer’s eyes narrowed. “Do it,” she said. “So long as you don't take out life support, do it.”

 

~

 

Communication with the DMA might be knocked out, but Katje had at least made contact with Charlese, who assured her that A.) the mountain was fine, and B.) Marty had gone to the Other in search of Sharley. Unfortunately, she knew no more about what was going on with Kilimanjaro than Katje herself did, just because news crews were sane enough to stay well away.

“What happened to the crazy people who would do anything for a story?” Katje grumbled. She had her laptop open, with three different news outlets splitting the screen. “At least there is a ship.” A ship that had gone into the ash cloud and had yet to be seen, but a ship nonetheless.

The ring of Gerald’s mobile phone startled them both — it was the _Doctor Who_ theme, because of course it was. It wasn't Charlese’s number that came up, though — it had to be Tanzanian. His hands trembled somewhat as he answered. “Hello?”

“Christ, I'm glad I got through.” It was Pat, a Pat with a voice like sandpaper over a stone. Gerald put the phone on speaker. “I’ve got the kids in Arusha. There’s ash here, but it’s not half so bad as in Moshi. We got out just as the volcano got going, but there’s plenty behind us whose motors sucked in too much ash and died.”

A tiny measure of relief flowed into Katje’s veins. The children would have been the most at risk, being so small and so young. “You are somewhere safe?”

“We’re in a shop,” he said. “Us and a load’v other people. Look, whenever the DMA gets its shite together, there’s a whole shitload’v people that’ll be herding through. There’s just no way Arusha can handle the numbers that’re already turning up, let alone the ones that’ll be behind. If not for the ship, it’d be way too much even if the fucking Door had been open all this time.”

Katje growled slightly. “There is still no talking to the DMA. It is why Marty went for Sharley, but you know how Time is in the Other. I don't know if I will be able to get through to you again, Pat, but when we have contact, I will try. The others were — were they all right, when you left them?”

“All right and pissed off,” he said. “I’ve got Mick’s family, and his in-laws, and I’m wanting to take them to the mountain once we get through. I promised Mick I’d look after them.”

“Of course,” Katje said. “Pat, we can see the cloud even from here. Stay inside, yes? Do not be a Donovan. You have five children who need you, and if I find out later you have been stupid, I will knock you down and sit on you.” She knew how daunted the poor man was by her at times; he’d more than likely take the threat seriously.

“I’ll...keep that in mind,” he said. “I’ll try to keep you posted, Katje, but I can’t be sure’v service here.”

“Us either. Take care of them, Pat, and yourself.”

The signal cut out before he could respond, and she groaned. “All right. We need to contact someone in charge in Arusha, if anyone is right now. And we need to be ready to get there, because when the Door is open, I think we will be needed.”

“Katje, honey, how are we supposed to get there?” Gerald asked. “And we have Miranda. If we didn't, I’d say let’s go, but….”

“We will find a way,” his wife said firmly, as she packed away the last of their clothes. The snap of the suitcase sounded oddly ominous. “And we go only when the Door is open, so we can send Miranda with Pat. He and Charlese can watch her for us.”

Gerald knew better than to argue with the steel in Katje’s tone, and God knew Arusha would probably need all the doctors it could get — the impending traffic jam at the Door would see to that.

 _All I wanted was a vacation,_ he thought. _Especially because another one’s not likely...ever._

He sighed. In Arusha, he’d be assaulted on all sides by the terror of God knew how many people. It would be wise for him to meditate while he had the chance.

 

~

 

Julifer downed the dregs of her coffee, and grimaced at the acidy taste. The techies were hard at work, and she felt so superfluous in her own office that she figured she ought to find something else to do. It wasn't hard — the problem was that the thing most useful was also the most distasteful.

Nullifiers like her were pretty rare, and most of the known ones worked for the DMA in some capacity. These crackpots also had one, however, and the trouble with them was that they were literally the only people who could block a telepath without possessing telepathy themselves. They wouldn’t have found the woman at all if her name and face weren’t available in the other terrorists’ minds — sloppy of them, but a good half of them didn't actually seem that bright, which just made their current success all the more galling. Miranda had to be rolling in her grave.

Geezer knew some pretty nasty interrogation techniques, but he’d flatly refused to use them on a woman, no matter how vile she might be. Nobody else had the stomach for it, so the woman — her name was Candice, apparently — sat locked in a holding cell, smug as the cat that ate the proverbial canary.

 _Fuck it._ Julifer probably wouldn’t be able to get anything from her, but she might as well try. Napping would be a mistake; she’d just wake all the more tired if she did. She’d drop when she dropped.

The corridors had yet to become any less creepy in their emptiness. Though Julifer had never actually seen a Memory, she couldn't help but wonder if this was what it felt like when they’d invaded during the War, just before Sharley destroyed the DMA. Lorna had said that the Memories filled the living with a type of dread like no other, and Julifer’s cursed mind could imagine it all too well. She found herself hurrying to the prison, where there were at least guards around. She didn't feel like the only person left in the world.

Four guards manned the entrance. The prison was the only place they’d renovated after Sharley’s hodgepodge rebuilding of the DMA, because it had gotten stuck somewhere in the 11th century, and would have been nowhere near as effective. The solid iron walls were back, though at least some attempt had been made at decorating the waiting area. The tile floor was softened by colorful hooked rugs (made by one of the guards, of course), while the wall facing the desk was almost wholly taken up by a trellis of honeysuckle beneath a full-spectrum light. A huge potted fern occupied one corner, carefully maintained; the combined effect made guard-duty less grim and depressing.

The quartet looked distinctly relieved by her arrival, which was not reassuring in the least. Last she’d checked, there had been few enough prisoners in here, so what the hell?

“Candice,” one of the guards said, when she asked. He rolled his eyes. “God damn is that woman annoying. Every time we go to check on her, she starts singing the worst pop songs the last thirty years have to offer. I never stopped to think about what kind of person would idolize Von Asshole after his death, but if I ever did, she wouldn’t come to mind. If I had to guess, she got dragooned by somebody else, and is just in it to stir shit up.”

“Oh joy,” Julifer sighed. “Well, let me in to see her, will you? If nothing else, I can see how long it takes her to run out of pop songs.”

“Better you than me,” he said. “At least she’s got a decent voice.”

Julifer followed him down the corridor, which was not decorated in the slightest — there was no point, really. She noticed that he had a taser at his belt, and winced a little — she could understand the necessity, with a nullifier, but still. Ouch.

“You got a visitor, Candice,” he said, knocking on the door. “Don't make me light you up.”

“Hell, have you actually had to do that?” Julifer asked.

“Not yet, but you never know.”

Candice, naturally, broke out into song. Julifer didn't recognize it, but it sounded very 80’s, and not in a good way.

The guard rolled his eyes, and unlocked the door. “Good luck,” he said. “I’ll be right outside.”

 _Yay,_ Julifer thought. The smell of iron hung heavy in her sinuses, and she twitched a bit as she stepped inside the cell. It was by necessity windowless, and the lights were recessed into the ceiling behind grates, to make them more difficult to break even by a telekinetic. Beyond that, it was like cells everywhere: narrow bed, toilet, and table bolted to the ground.

Candice sat on the bed, back against the wall. She was a good-looking woman, with blonde hair that looked highlighted by the sun rather than a salon, and a number of freckles scattered across her slightly sunburnt face. Julifer guessed she was probably late twenties to early thirties — a sporty type who’d probably been a cheerleader in high school, or at least wanted to be one. No, she did not at all look like the kind of whacko who would even ponder the existence of Von Rached ‘acolytes’, much less join them.

“You can’t make me talk,” the woman said.

“I know,” Julifer said, as she hopped up onto the table. “I don't have to — we’re getting plenty out of the others. I just want to know... _why_? I mean, a lot of those guys look like the sort of social misfit that’d sign on to the first antisocial cause that came their way, but you look like a damn lifeguard. What the hell was missing in your life, that this seemed like a good idea?”

Sudden interest sparked in Candice’s eyes, and Julifer wondered if anyone had actually bothered asking her why. One of the first things Miranda had taught her was that the best way to get to know about someone was to invite them to talk about themselves — most of the time, they’d give away far more than they realized. “You really want to know?”

“I do,” Julifer said, “because I just...I can’t fathom it, Candice. I’m usually pretty good at putting myself in other people’s shoes, but I just can’t with this. Von Rached’s dead. He’s really, really dead — wherever he’s gone, odds are good he can’t see you, and I doubt he’d care if he could. Is he just some excuse for you to do something nasty? Because you wouldn’t be the only one in this group to sign on for some other reason than being Von Rached wannabe.”

The woman shrugged. “I thought he had a good philosophy,” she said. “This place has too much of a stranglehold on our world — it’s like a monopoly, you know? There were all these different countries for...well, ever, and then the fever happens and all of a sudden the DMA’s the only thing that matters. He had the right idea in wanting to end this place.”

Julifer pinched the bridge of her nose. “You do realize that the real reason he wanted to end us was petty revenge, right? He didn't care about the rest of the world. You, me, and everything in it could’ve been flushed down the biggest toilet in the universe for all he cared. In all my life I’ve never met someone who came even close to his ‘it’s all about me’ attitude.”

Candice’s eyes widened. “You actually met him?”

“Unfortunately, yes. He was terrifying just by existing, and all the more so because he didn't have some cause,” Julifer said. “Candice, that dude did shit because he _could_. Because until he ran into Lorna, nobody could stop him. He’s not someone to admire. He would have looked at you and your principles as something to use and then toss when you — and they — weren’t useful anymore. And he tended to kill people he was done with.”

“Dunno,” Candice said, as she idly cracked her ankles. “I saw him on the news, when he crashed Lorna’s presentation in the U.N. Guy was kinda hot.”

Julifer’s nose wrinkled. Admittedly she didn't swing that way, but even if she had, the bastard had been so creepy that neither ‘hot’ nor anything like it would have been adjectives she’d have applied to him. Yikes. “Riiight. Gonna have to take your word on that one, but I really, really doubt you’d think that if you’d actually met him. You’d’ve been too busy trying not to piss yourself outta fear he’d break your neck if you breathed wrong, because God knows the rest of us were. This has been...illuminating, Candice. I don't know what’ll happen to you once this is over, but if I was you, I’d get used to this cell. I can’t imagine Katje’ll let you go.”

She rose, and pounded on the door. “I’m done,” she called.

The guard let her out, and eyed her expression as he locked the door again. “You learn anything?”

“I learned...something,” she said. “Whether or not it’ll be any actual use remains to be seen, but at least it explains a bit.”


	7. Chapter Seven

Julifer unhooked her radio from her belt, but before she could call Geezer, it crackled to life.

“Julifer, this is home base. Our little problem is no longer a problem. You want us to shut off the alarm, or shift it?”

“Neither,” she said, though her heart leapt. “Did you kill it, or isolate it?”

“Isolate.” That was a second techie. “We don't know yet if they’ve got some backup that would trigger if we killed it, and we want a better look at the damn thing. It’s...elegant, to put it mildly.”

It would seem like the worm’s architect was one of the few actually competent people this group had. “Can you get communications back up?” she asked, now jogging back toward her makeshift office. “We need to get in contact with the outside world, because I guarantee you everyone who’s been trying to contact _us_ will be freaking the fuck out right now — and there might well have been some attack on Earth, too.” Whether or not it had been successful might be another story, but they’d just have to see. “I don't want any of these asshats having any idea we’re on to them yet, just in case there’s more of them than we’ve found.” Thus far the number stood at fourteen, but there might be more the telepaths hadn't discovered — though if the rest of them were this inept, maybe they didn't need to worry much.

 _Unless these guys were designed to fail,_ she thought, and wished she hadn't. Von Rached had sent spies with the intent of them getting caught, so it would make sense if some wannabe was doing the same thing — and it might explain why so few of them seemed to truly care much about their supposed cause. Most of them so far were in it for personal reasons, not ideological, and a few of them didn't seem terribly perturbed to have been caught. Just...what the fuck?

 _Contact,_ Julifer told herself. _Contact, then get the Doors open. God fucking knows when or if we can get Sharley here, but Lorna can just rip a few people’s brains apart, if she’s willing to do it._ And once they got Katje and Gerald back, maybe she could actually take a goddamn nap.

 

~

 

Admittedly, Ratiri wasn't terribly familiar with the details of volcanic activity, but he was pretty sure it shouldn’t be easing off after less than a day...right? Maybe it wasn't actually; maybe the air currents had merely shifted, and he in his ignorance took it as the cone letting up, but he actually doubted that.

He’d been searching the ground for stragglers when one of the zombie crew very firmly shoved him into a boat, with stern orders that he go be alive somewhere else. Such was his exhaustion that he didn't even attempt to argue.

The ship’s interior was such a labyrinth that he didn't have a hope in hell of finding his family, but at least its rescued passengers were more or less sorted; the chaos he’d feared must have passed and gone.

Just how many people had been brought aboard? Considering there had been precious few stragglers left when he was so unceremoniously yanked up here himself, it had to be thousands — and God knew each room he passed was about as crowded as it could safely get. Still, the air, though slightly stuffy, was clean, and people were resting rather than fleeing for their lives.

He sat now in a corner of the sickbay, which was overflowing. It was so very like the sickbay on Jary’s ship that it was oddly comforting, even if they’d long since used up all its supplies. The crowd was all but silent, though, with the kind of shell-shocked expressions he’d seen all too often during the War. For them, for now, the disaster was over, but their minds had yet to accept that fact — or possibly to comprehend that it had happened in the first place.

An elderly woman sat not far from him. She’d done her best to wipe the ash off her face, but her dark skin was still streaked with grey. “What will we do?” she asked, of no one in particular. “Moshi is already buried. Where will we go?”

“We’ll find somewhere for you.” The rasp in Ratiri’s voice surprised him; it sounded like he’d been chain-smoking Lucky Strikes for sixty years. “The DMA will get you somewhere, until we know what kind of work it will take to repair Moshi.” _If that’s even possible._ The eruption of Mount St. Helens had so devastated the mountain’s landscape that it hadn't been recoverable, but neither this woman nor anyone around her needed to hear that.

Walls and floor suddenly vibrated with the growl of the ship’s great engines, and Ratiri wondered how they could even function amid so much ash. They wouldn’t be leaving if there was anyone left alive to be found on the ground; Moshi urban was now a town of ghosts and ash. He could only hope that rural Moshi would be safe from any lahars that made it past Lorna and whatever terrakinetics had been on the ground.

Through their bond, Ratiri could feel that his wife was well and truly unconscious. He ought to try to find her, now that he’d rested a bit. It might well be hours before she woke, but at least he’d be there when she did.

Hauling himself to his feet took more effort than he liked, and he steadfastly ignored the fact that he was forty-eight might have something to do with it. Using his Gift to such an extent would have drained anyone

 _Sure,_ he thought, _you keep telling yourself that._

Making his way through sickbay took some doing, because not only was it as packed as it could be, the ship was moving now. Not stepping on someone took real effort.

At least the corridor was empty, though a trail of ash had tracked through it. Ratiri paused a moment, just to draw a free breath — he didn't think he’d ever take clean air for granted again.

Like Jary’s ship, the _Nezhiti’s_ corridors were a downright warren, and he wondered how long it took new crew members to stop getting lost. The ship was new enough that the cedar-scent of its wood still lingered. It was soothing, and it reminded him of home. He could only be grateful he had a home to go _to_ , since Christ knew these poor people didn't.

His bond with Lorna acted rather like a homing-beacon, though he’d swear he traversed half the length of the blood ship before he found his wife, tucked away in a guest cabin. Her face was as ashy as the powder that had dusted her hair, and the rusty-dark remnants of a nosebleed edged her nostrils, but her aura was bright and strong.

There were four outer people crammed into this cabin, all asleep (and seemingly uninjured), and he picked his ginger way around them. The bed was a double, and Lorna shared it with a heavily pregnant young woman.

 _We’re alive,_ Ratiri thought, as he sat below his wife’s feet — her tiny stature left him plenty of room. _So many survived who would have died, if not for the ship._ Of course, that didn't mean more would not die later, because so many had to have inhaled too much ash, and the community’s healers were beyond exhausted. Even all of Arusha’s might not be enough.

 _Later,_ he told himself. For now, let the volcano belch, and let whatever giant being had passed through the ash cloud deal with. He didn't know how many volcanic deities might be sprinkled throughout Africa, but if he'd been a betting man, he would have wagered that massive, humanoid figure was among them.

He shut his eyes, and let the engines’ rumble soothe him. Soon enough he was sound asleep, slumped against the footboard.

 

~

 

The jangle of the satphone jerked Gerald right out of his meditation. Katje’s harsh sound of triumph made sure he didn't get back into it.

“Julifer?” she said. “Whiskey Tango Foxtrot. How’s that for a slice of fried gold?”

Gerald snorted a laugh into his sleeve. They’d swapped around Miranda’s old code phrases and passwords, and since once of Julifer’s favorite movies was _Shaun of the Dead_ , film quotes abounded. He was never, ever going to get over the sight of Geezer saying, ‘Fuck-a-doodle-do.’ Geezer was probably never going to get over _saying_ it.

Katje’s eyes narrowed. “We will be there as soon as we can,” she said, “though that might take a while, considering the volcano. Kilimanjaro is erupting...a lot. Here, hang on.” She set the phone to speaker.

“What?!” Julifer demanded. “Shit, are the D&D’s okay?”

“Pat and the children are safe,” Katje said. “No word on the rest yet, but there is a ship.”

Julifer actually _growled._ “God fucking dammit, I was afraid something was happening out there, but I didn't think it’d be _that_. We’ve got the world’s most inept terrorists in here right now. Only one who managed to do a damn thing successfully was whoever planted the worm that took over our system. We’re going to open the Arusha Door, so if you can get ahold of Pat, let him know. If there’s any of these assholes we haven’t caught yet, they can deal with having a giant influx of refugees thrown at them.”

Gerald blinked. “Julifer, do me a favor and find an empath or an aura-manipulator, okay? I’d rather not come home and find you had an aneurysm.”

Geezer’s voice issued through the phone. “I’ll look after her. You just get to the Door, and we can get Miranda down to Charlese. She’ll be safe outta the way there.”

The Miranda in question was busy with a coloring book, calm as you please. Gerald hoped Arusha wouldn’t freak her out too much, but if it was as bad as he suspected, that was inevitable.

“We’ll do what we have to,” Katje said. “Over and out.”

“Keep your phone on and we’ll update you,” Julifer said. “Over and out.”

“Mama, are we going now?” Miranda’s big eyes regarded her parents with open curiosity.

“Yes, liefje.”

The girl must have been around Julifer too long, because her response was a phlegmatic, “Cool beans.”

 

~

 

The silence of the shop was so complete and funereal that the jangling of the satphone would have made Pat piss himself if he wasn't so tired. His limbs felt heavy as lead, and his brain was sandy with fatigue, but one look at the caller ID temporarily cleared some of his mental fog.

“Katje?” he said. “For Christ’s sake, tell me you’ve got good news.”

“Get to the Door,” she said. “You and everyone with you. We have contact with the DMA, and they are going to open that Door as soon as they can.” She sounded almost eerily calm, but Pat knew her well enough to hear the rage beneath it. He did not envy whatever had put it there.

“Can do,” he said, and winced as he hauled himself to his feet.

“Good. Over and out.”

 _Okay then,_ he thought. “Door, you lot,” he said. “It’s opening, and we’d best get to it before the rest’v bloody Arusha finds out.” Yes, it was selfish of him, but at this point, he didn't care. These children needed to be somewhere safe, and if he had to get them at the head of the line before there even _was_ a line, so be it.

He tried Eris’s phone one more time before they mobilized, but wasn't surprised when he got no answer. She might not even have it anymore, if the ship rescue had been as chaotic as he expected. The fact that she might not have made it onto the ship was not one he was willing to consider.

The problem — well, the most pressing problem — was that a number of these children were quite young, and wouldn’t have managed a four-kilometer walk even under the best of circumstances. Saoirse, Mairead, and Jerry would be fine; they’d made treks longer than that on the mountain, but there was no way Sam and Donna could do it. He hadn't noticed just how many of the children in his bus had been carrying younger ones, but he could see now it was too many for his liking.

“Everybody over sixty centimeters tall, grab a kid,” he said. “If we swap around as we go, we might just all make it.” If one of Eris’s twins could cling onto his back, he could carry the other one, and hope he didn't drop before they got there.

On went their makeshift masks, and outside they plunged. At least they could see how he’d earned his weariness: the tree-tunnel extended a solid two kilometers, so they could at least make it halfway to the door with relative shelter. The air was brutally hot, but for now there would be no ash in their eyes.

 _Get to the Door,_ he told himself. _Just get to the Door._ Soon enough it would literally be in sight, but Pat couldn't remember ever being this tired. He’d never understood the phrase ‘bone-deep weariness’ before, but he sure as hell did now. All he could do was put one foot in front of the other, while Saoirse, Mairead, and Jerry walked in front of him, so that he could keep them in his sight. Yes, there was still a ways to go within the DMA itself before he got to the mountain, but he wouldn’t think of _that_ right now, either.

Word got out, somehow, because their group was joined by so many others, streaming out of their shelters. His exhaustion-fuzzed brain managed to register that fact that somehow, things had not descended into chaos...yet. Perhaps, like him, everyone was just too tired and too stunned to think of pushing or rioting.

Someone, it seemed, had managed to continue what he’d started, more or less — more canopy passed the edge of his work with the trees, and though it wasn't so thick as his, it was better than nothing at all. The wind, the heat, and the hellish red of the sky — it reminded him of the nuclear apocalypse he’d so feared as a child, when everyone said the Cold War was likely to turn hot at a moment’s notice. He didn't even want to know what this was going to do to the weather patterns for the next Christ knew how long.

One step, and another, and another after that. Sweat ran in rivulets down his face, stinging in his eyes, but his arms were too full of twin to wipe them. He had to keep his head down, or risk what little ash fell through the canopy getting into his eyes, too. Pat pushed on with the kind of grim purpose that, while slow, was unlikely to be stopped by anything short of a semi truck. A much as he wanted to run when they spotted the Door terminal, he simply didn't have the energy.

Fortunately, there was still room when he reached it; even more fortunately, the fucking Door was actually open. He could have wept with relief as he ushered the children inside, and he did his best to keep his little group together. Whatever the hell had happened in here, nothing seemed to have been broken or destroyed; the only thing out of the ordinary, aside from the corridor’s emptiness, was the faint yellow light that blinked on and off — fuck, was that the Yellow Alert?

 _Not now,_ he told himself. _Mountain. I doubt anyone’ll care if they have to crash on the sitting-room floor._

“Da, can we rest somewhere?” Saoirse asked. “I’m thirsty.”

 _“Us too,”_ the twins chorused.

Jesus...there were waiting-areas scattered all over the place, and Pat, not knowing what else to do, shepherded his little group into the nearest one he actually knew of. The air was blessedly cool after the oven-heat of Tanzania, and though the floor was hard, it was carpeted (rusty shag, very 70’s). He was taking a gamble with the water; for all he knew, whoever had fucked things up in here had poisoned it, but he was so thirsty himself that he counted it worth the risk. It tasted fine when he gulped a cup down, and since he didn't immediately die, he filled paper cups and passed them around. The children especially needed to rehydrate as fast as they could.

“We are safe in here?” Saida asked quietly. She only took a cup once she had made sure both her children had one.

“We are,” Pat sighed. “Everybody have a rest and a drink, for now. We’ll worry about moving once we won’t all keel over.” What looked like most of Saida’s family had jammed in here along with the children, and more people ooched in behind them, until there wasn't a centimeter of spare floor.

“Then we will go to your house?” Saida’s mother asked.

“Yeah,” he sighed, and shut his eyes. “And we’ll stay there.” He might not be able to have a nap yet, but at least he could shut his eyes.

 

~

 

Ratiri didn't know he’d fallen asleep until he was woken by Lorna’s movements. She sat up, and groaned.

“I’m assuming I'm not dead,” she said, or tried to; her abused voice refused to produce more than a whisper. _This isn’t the pale forest,_ she tried again, as her eyes found his. _I'm taking it that’s a good sign._

He winced. The sclera of both her eyes had been washed red by subconjunctival hemorrhage — her blood pressure must have been sky-high before she passed out. She was probably fortunate she hadn't had an aneurysm.

 _It is,_ he said, and pulled her close. _Fortunately this ship came. Our work’s done, for now._

_What about Shiv and Eris?_

_They’re both on board,_ he said. _Mick too, though I don't know where any of them are exactly._ The ship creaked around them, and the engines hummed; through the porthole, Ratiri could see that the sky was much lighter. Where were they now? He wasn't sure how long he’d been asleep.

Lorna sighed. _We should probably go see what’s going on,_ she said. _If there’s even anything to see._

 _Oh, there is,_ he said. He tried to help her to her feet, and she nearly fell on her face.

 _Fuck,_ she said. _All right, I need you as a walking-stick, I guess._

Somehow, they made it out of the room without waking any of the others. The corridors were empty, and the ship so quiet that he wondered if everyone else had nodded off as soon as they got the chance. Neither one of them knew where the hell the cabin was on this ship, but Ratiri figured they’d find out once they ran across a crew member.

A tiny zombie girl came dancing down the ash-strewn corridor, plastered with ash from head to toe. “Hey, awake people,” she said. “Lady, you’re not like, an Aelis zombie, are you?”

Lorna laughed, sandpaper-rough. _No,_ she said. _Just tired. Where are we?_

“Just over Madagascar,” the girl said. “The Arusha Door’s a traffic-jam, so Captain Louisa figured we’d better go somewhere that could handle this load.”

“They’re actually open?” Ratiri asked. He could have collapsed in relief.

“Yeah, but we don't know any more than that,” the girl said. “We hauled so much ass we should be at the Door in like twenty minutes — Captain Louisa’s talking to some people in Mahabo, ’cause they’re closest to Madagascar’s Door. C’mon, you’re adults, she might want to talk to you, too.”

Lorna looked at Ratiri, and he looked back. “Perfect,” he said, “but don't go too fast, okay? We’re tired and old.”

“I could kinda tell,” the girl said cheerfully, and led them off, scarcely stirring any ash in her wake.

Madagascar. He really must have been asleep for a while, to have made it so far, and yet he felt he could sleep for another week yet.

 _Plenty’v time to sleep when you’re dead,_ Lorna said, even as she leaned on him a bit more heavily. The aura over her back was grey with pain; her scars had to be killing her, but Ratiri didn't dare try to do anything about it yet — not when he was so tired himself. Lorna wouldn’t thank him for keeling over.

The deck, when they reached it, was no longer completely covered in ash; obviously, crew had been hard at work. Even as they watched, a young boy in a respirator ran past, blasting a path through the ash that was left with what looked like a snowblower.

 _At least someone’s enjoying themselves,_ Lorna said, and burst into giggles before she could help it. She was still so tired, and her nerves still so frazzled, that she really couldn’t help it. Part of her was astonished she was even alive, because she had no memory of getting onto the ship — someone must have found her after she’d blacked out. If that someone wasn't Ratiri, she’d be very surprised.

She was glad enough when they reached the captain’s cabin (which certainly seemed a solid mile away), where there was no ash at all. It was constructed along the same lines as Jary’s, though the decor was rather different — it was a mishmash of the Victorian and the modern, with a huge desk strewn with maps. The lamps looked like something out of the nineteenth century, but they had bulbs rather than wicks. Huge windows let the reddish light of the ash-hazed sky — it looked, Lorna guessed, something like the Other must.

The captain herself was a tall woman of indeterminate race — olive skin, wavy dark hair held back in a ponytail, and clear dark eyes — and she looked to be somewhere in her late twenties, though if she’d come from the Other, there was no telling when she’d been born.

“Oh good, you’re not dead,” she said. Her accent was faint, but it was definitely English. “DMA’s waiting for you, from what little we can tell. There’s so much chatter we can't keep up, and I'm pretty sure most of it’s in code. Bleedin’ inept terrorists, sounds like.” The word ‘terrorists’ seemed to sit unfamiliar on her tongue, as though she’d only acquired it once she’d returned to Earth.

“Fucking brilliant.” Maybe it was her weariness, but Lorna honestly wasn't sure what she and Ratiri were meant to do. They were both so exhausted, and their Gifts so drained, that they were the next best thing to useless.

She didn't realize she’d said that aloud until the captain snorted. “Look in a mirror,” she said. “You look like a cross between a zombie and a...a demon of some sort.”

There was a small mirror on the wall, so Lorna did just that. “Oh, good Jesus.” The captain wasn't kidding. Her face was grey, her hair a nightmare, and what the _fuck_ was wrong with her eyes? The vision in the good one was fine, but both of them were filled with blood. Honestly, she looked too much like Aelis for her own comfort.

“Yep,” the captain said. “Just go sit and stare people out of countenance. Now sit down, the both of you, before you fall.”

There was only one chair available facing the desk, so Ratiri sat, and Lorna sat on him. She could easily have fallen asleep again, breathing in his Ratiri-scent, if not for the captain’s voice.

“There’s another ship headed for Tanzania, but it started off in Algeria, so it will be a bit yet before it gets there. There’s still loads of people who really ought to be somewhere else until that volcano stops...stops vomiting.” She sighed. “I was twelve when Krakatoa erupted, and even with the newspapers’ illustrations I could barely imagine what it must be like, to witness that.”

“Kilimanjaro and Krakatoa are both stratovolcanoes,” Ratiri said. “It was probably very like watching this one.”

“In that case,” she sighed, “I am glad I missed it. Drink some water and eat something, while you have a chance.” The bottles of water she handed them were plastic, not glass, and seemed somewhat out-of-place.

She didn't seem to have a great deal of food, but two slightly messy rye-and-salami sandwiches were somehow managed. Ratiri felt a touch more human, and Lorna’s aura was a big less grey. “Can they feed this lot, at the...Jesus, the Door’s between Mahabo and...another place with an M, right?” she asked.

“Mandabe,” the captain said. “And yes. They’ve got their heads on straight, and that there’s no mistaking. We’ve not got anything like an accurate headcount, but we’ve got something like thirty thousand people aboard.”

Ratiri’s eyebrows shot skyward. “You do?” he asked. “ _Where?_ ” Yes, all the rooms he’d seen had been full, but still.

Captain Louisa’s lips twisted in a half-smile. “Everyone always underestimates the carrying capacity of these ships. In the Other, we built them to evacuate ground settlements that came under attack by the Other’s...well, creatures.”

Thirty thousand...it seemed like a staggering number, and yet it was a fraction of Moshi Urban’s population. At least they must have cleared everyone in immediate danger from the volcano, though it still left tens of thousands fleeing. “Are you going back, once everyone’s unloaded?” he asked.

“We are. And I fed you for more reasons than one — we’ve got the unloading down to an art, but these people will be scared, and confused. I don't want anyone hurting themselves in a panic, which is where you come in,” Louisa said, pointing at Lorna. “I know you’re too tired to actually do much, but just go out there and look like you’re doing something and you’ll help. People know who you are.”

Lorna winced, and sighed. “All right,” she said. “But if I fall on my face, it’s not my fault. I’m too old for this shit.”

The ship’s great engines silenced, and Captain Louisa rose. “Best get going.” Donning her hat, she stalked out onto the deck.

 

~

 

What followed flirted with chaos, but somehow never quite crossed the line.

Ratiri was damned glad he’d had some food and water, because God knew he was about run off his feet. The evacuees had been loaded and distributed without much in the way of organization, just because there had been no time, and now he and the other staff found themselves scrambling to sort the wounded into some kind of priority list.

The problem was that the ship really was staggeringly huge, and there were just not enough medical personnel. Ratiri had wound up deputizing anyone who looked fit enough to help, and even then it was all they could do to keep order.

He was tall enough that he could very easily see just how vast the crowd was — he could well believe the captain’s estimate of their numbers. It looked as though many had tried to clean their faces, but they were still streaked with sweat and ash. Many wore the same hollow, thousand-yard stare he’d seen all too often in the War. Their lives had been blown to bits, literally.

Who was going to _feed_ these people? He couldn’t imagine Madagascar was equipped for an influx of people this huge, just because nobody was — even if half of them went to the DMA, this lot alone would be around fifteen thousand — and there would be more to come, eventually. Even the uninjured had to be dehydrated, because they could have drained the ship’s water supply dry and it still wouldn’t have been nearly enough.

But he could do nothing about any of it, so he sorted. At least the air was cool, this high off the ground; ash might be all but ground into his skin, but he was no longer sweating half to death.

 _Norway,_ he thought, as he helped an elderly man with a poorly-bandaged head wound into a lifeboat. His wife was uninjured, but she refused to leave him, and Ratiri didn't protest. Getting anyone to Norway was a no-go right now, but in time, when it all calmed down….

“Things will be all right, won’t they?” The speaker was a young woman, accompanied by a girl too old to be her daughter — a sister, probably.

“As my wife is fond of saying, things usually are, in the end,” he said, though he was fully aware that wasn't actually an answer. “Do you have other family?”

“Our father is somewhere,” she said, as she glanced down at the girl. “Our brother was in Arusha.”

“Your brother might well already be in the DMA,” Ratiri said. “We’ll find your father, though it might take a while. Just stay together.”

He wished there was more that he could say, but he could think of no reassurance that wouldn’t be totally baseless.

A small zombie saved him from floundering. The boy wormed his way through the cloud, with Lorna in tow. “The DMA wants you,” he said. He looked as though he’d been no more than eight when he’d died — the Memories had got him, if the wounds on his neck and face were any indication. “Go on down with that boat — we can handle things from here.”

Ratiri was almost pathetically grateful, and Lorna looked to be as well. They were almost certainly not going to like what they would _find_ at the DMA, but at least there was a healthy chance of more food and water. No doubt Siobhan and Eris would get sent after them sooner or later, since they were both so drained they were of use to no one.

Into the boat he and Lorna went, and he was so weary that the height simply couldn’t alarm him. Lorna actually dozed off again until they were lowered down to earth, and he wondered just what she’d actually done. The fact that there was no fighting a volcano was hardly going to stop her from trying, and it seemed it hadn't. That even she, with all her strength and power, could be so drained...it was sobering testament to the intractability of nature. It it felt like being a bastard, no amount of magic in the world was going to change it.

The pair of them tried not to stumble on their way to the Door, guided by a guard in DMA black fatigues. Nobody seemed to resent them jumping the line, but it was possible not that many people even noticed. It had been...well, it had been a day.

There was something inexpressibly comforting about being back in a familiar environment, in air clear and cool and suffused with the faint, sharp, cedar-petrichor scent of magic. While it didn't exactly banish their exhaustion, it muted it somewhat. The strained-amber glow of the Yellow Alert wasn't enough to dispel the effect.

“Julifer said to take you to her,” their guide said quietly. “She and Gavin and Geezer have a base going. Lorna, are you in any condition to go...excavating?”

It was a few moments before she answered. “I don't know,” she said at last. “I won’t know until I try.”

The fact that she didn't protest the very idea spoke volumes to Ratiri. She was so, so adamant about the sanctity of the human mind, and yet she now seemed willing to violate it without a qualm. After what they had witnessed and endured, he couldn’t blame her, but he knew his wife. Lorna might be able to do it, but that didn't mean she’d be able to live with herself later.

But that would have to wait. Whatever was to come, for now she was a small, grim, nightmare figure with eyes of blood, jaundiced in the light. Her expression might be unreadable, but her aura was not, and it worried him immensely: it ought to flare red with wrath, but instead it was pale and cold in a way he’d never before seen it. He’d never seen such an aura before on _anyone_ , and a whole new sort of worry gnawed at him.

Wisely, he said nothing, but he kept an eye on her as they trod the hallways, which eventually thinned. This block of offices and conference room was fairly removed from the more active sections of the DMA, though Ratiri was pretty sure they’d wind up with more occupants anyway. People still milled about here, too, but with rather more purpose — technopaths and telepaths, so far as he could tell.

“They’ve got a prisoner,” their guide said, as he keyed open the door. “Gavin’s been at him, but Gavin’s…”

“Been trained by me, and probably has mental hives over what he’s doing,” Lorna said. “I know. I’ll deal with it.”

They entered the room to find a weary Gavin, a frazzled Julifer, and a Geezer who looked ready to punch someone. Their prisoner was physically tied to a chair, which spoke to just how tired Gavin actually had to be.

Ratiri eyed him. The man was somewhere in his thirties, tall and reasonably fit, with auburn hair and a ruddy face that spoke of time outdoors. Not bad-looking, nor the sort Ratiri would have figured to be the kind of crackpot who’d want to be a terrorist in the first place — he looked like a history teacher. _Just goes to show that you never can tell._

He looked as exhausted as Gavin, but there was a demented sort of satisfaction in his blue eyes. Gavin’s training must have been holding him back, and this prick probably knew it. Some people really did consider ethics to be a weakness. His smug expression faltered when he saw Lorna, however, and Ratiri could hardly fault him; in that moment, she looked rather like the sort of evil fairy that dragged people off the road and drowned them in bogs.

“Jesus, you look like shit,” Geezer said. “Why the fuck aren’t you sleeping it off somewhere?”

“Oh, I will, once I’m done with this one,” Lorna said. “Why’s he still conscious?”

“He’s got a block,” Gavin sighed. “Good one. I could probably break it, but I don't know what it’d do to him. Dunno if he’d wind up like Jameson or not.”

“And none of you pansies would allow that,” their prisoner said. “You just kept him alive because you didn't want his death on your hands.”

Ratiri wondered just how in the hell this man could know that — Jameson had died when the Memories invaded the DMA, but that was hardly common knowledge. And almost _nobody_ knew just why Lorna had been so hesitant to plumb his mind — or that she’d even been hesitant in the first place. Who the hell was this guy, and who the hell did he work for?

Lorna drew a chair up to face him. She seemed absurdly small by comparison, and yet that just made the evil-fairy comparison all the more apt. “You know, I have a philosophy about killing people, Alex,” she said. “I’ve done a lot’v nasty shit in my life, but I’ve always tried not to be a murderer. I tell myself it’s because I want to be better than that, but there’s part’v it, something underneath, that’s a whole lot less noble.”

His expression had shifted back to unease, and his aura flooded with dark fear, but he didn't actually say anything.

“See, the thing about killing people, Alex, is that the dead don't suffer. Death would've been a kindness to Jameson — so long as he was alive, he was trapped in his own head. He couldn't go through that pale forest, or to whatever’s on the other side. He was in the limbo’v his own making.” Her hoarse voice nearly gave out, soft and strangely calm. When she smiled, however, it chilled Ratiri to the core. There was so little of _Lorna_ in that smile — or at least, so little of the one that he knew. The Blank still lurked at the back of her mind, subdued but not banished — oh God, was that thing why her aura was...what it was? Ratiri had never actually seen it, but he’d heard stories from her siblings.

The hapless Alex stared at her, wide-eyed. All trace of self-satisfaction had vanished. Under any other circumstances, he might have been pitiable.

“I’m not going to kill you, Alex,” Lorna said. “I’m not even going to hurt you, if I can avoid it. If I can’t...well, too bad for you. If you’ve got any brain at all, you’ll take down that block before I break it.”

Grey-faced, the man swallowed. “I can’t,” he whispered. “I didn't make it. She did.”

Lorna’s head tilted slightly, and she regarded him with a gaze sharp as razors. “Well,” she said softly, “that’s unfortunate.” She reached out one small, grimy hand, her fingers brushing light over his skin, and he went utterly still.

 _Ratiri, what the hell is she doing?_ Gavin asked. Whatever it was, it had to be fucking wrong, but not for anything would he have intervened. Lorna was so physically nonthreatening that it made any real flexing of her Gift all the more jarring.

_We’ll find out eventually. Meanwhile, it might be best if we just...don't move._

Lorna shut her eyes. Alex’s mind was already fatigued from Gavin’s work, and she was pleased to see that Gavin had been as careful as he could — and that he’d delved rather far, in spite of how wrong it must have felt to him.

_Alex’s mental landscape was of little interest to her — Gavin would surely have taken anything important from it already. She passed through it like a shadow, winding her way to the block. It was quite deep; Lorna was impressed Gavin had been willing to go that far, given his training. His presence was much lighter here, which suggested hesitation, and she knew that he and all the other telepaths would need care and reassurance after what they’d been forced to do._

_Her own lack of compunction ought to have worried her, but there was no room for it. The block was an admittedly impressive construct of mental stone — whoever had built it was a more powerful telepath than any she’d yet seen who wasn't her or Von Rached. Even Gavin couldn’t have taken them — a her, apparently, if Alex was to be believed — on._

_Strong though it was, Lorna could have smashed it if she’d wanted to, but that was no doubt what her mysterious adversary expected. Whoever she was, she knew about Jameson — and if she knew about Jameson, she might well also know just what Von Rached had used him for, and how. Odds were good she’d be expecting a telepathic hammer, so that was exactly what Lorna wouldn’t give her._

_It took quite a while to find even the slightest crack in that barrier, but Lorna was patient. In time she found one, and slipped through it as softly and lightly as fog._

_What she found within filled her with an odd, icy rage. It wasn't something visible, but it was very much tangible: within this asshole’s head was a sort of telepathic bomb of a sort she’d never even imagined possible. It was a damn good thing neither she nor Gavin had tried to hammer at that block, because this thing was designed to do what Von Rached had inadvertently done to her, when she was trapped in the dying Miranda’s head: hitting it wouldn’t just kill Alex, it would take out whoever struck at him. Hell, it might even have killed_ her _._

Oh, I don't think so, _she thought. The strange thing was tied into Alex’s Gift, but it was an artificial thing, and one she severed with relative ease. It sat now like a deactivated mine — trying to get rid of it entirely would just set it off, but it could tumble about for the rest of his life, however long that might be._

_As she’d expected, there was the faintest trace of an alien presence — so faint that even she could scarcely detect it. This woman, whoever she was, had a line to Alex’s mind. Gently, Lorna took it, but she didn't sever it — she transferred it to her own mind, with such exquisite care that the woman hopefully would not even notice. Walling it away was difficult, but nobody could build mental blocks quite like Lorna Duncan._

_She could follow it, and follow she did, light as a spider. This woman had to be hiding somewhere, and the DMA was damn well going to know where. Locating someone on Earth was not an easy proposition, because Earth was, well, huge, but it could be done._

_Could, and was. Lorna had no idea how long it took her, because it certainly felt like forever, but eventually the smoke of her thought ghosted around the mind of her target._

“Found you,” she whispered.

_Too late, the woman realized she was there — too late, because the force of Lorna’s Gift slammed into her mind like Thor’s hammer, and snapped the lines of her consciousness like rotted thread. Oh, she knew where this woman was, all right. By morning, the bitch would be hers._


	8. Chapter Eight

Julifer eyed Lorna with growing wariness.

She liked Lorna, quite a bit, but she’d been trained by Miranda, and a more paranoid woman had never walked the Earth. They’d had more than one discussion about the brutal fact that if Lorna ever got pissed and really lost her shit, there wasn't a damn one of them that could stop her. Her principles were ironclad, but she was a human being, and anyone could reach the end of their tether.

What hadn't occurred to her was what might happen if Lorna  _ didn't. _

Only once in her life had Julifer ever seen anything like the frigid wrath that now emanated from her tiny, filthy friend. Her good eye was icy, her still, non-expression so reptilian she scarcely seemed human. That cold inhumanity was a little too reminiscent of Von Rached, and yet somehow even worse, because at least he had been a dispassionate monster. Whatever else might have been said of him, Julifer had never seen any actual malice. (Well, okay, there’d been an undercurrent when he talked to Ratiri, but at least he hadn't actually  _ done  _ anything.)

“I know where she is,” Lorna said softly, even as Alex slumped into unconsciousness. Her tone was dreadful, because it was almost, but not quite, completely detached. “Germany. Where all self-respecting Von Rached wannabes would go. She’ll be unconscious a while yet, if you can get to her.”

“Where is she exactly?” Geezer asked. He didn't look any less disturbed than Julifer felt.

“Soest. I know it’s far from the Door, but there’s got to be someone on that side who can bring her to the Door.” Germany’s closest Door was outside Magdeburg — a bit of a drive, but it could be done. “Get her here, but keep her unconscious. I'll deal with her tomorrow.” Lorna looked just about ready to drop where she sat.

“Go sleep,” Geezer ordered. “I’ll let you know once we’ve got her.” He had no intention of doing any such thing, but she didn't need to know that.

Only one Ratiri and Lorna had gone did any of them quite dare really breathe. “Man, fuck everything,” Gavin sighed. “I’m about ready to pass out myself.”

“You’re not the only one,” Julifer said. “You two go sleep — I’ll hold things down until Katje and Gerald get back.”

Geezer snorted. “Not fucking likely. We can all go die when they get here.”

 

~

 

Pat had intended to keep all of Saida’s family at the house, but Charlese, who in that moment had far more common sense, had most of them ferried down to the inn at the base of the mountain. Only Saida and her kids remained; after a shower and a snack, the pair were put down for a nap in Marty’s room. Once Saoirse and both sets of twins were both clean and fed, Pat took his own shower, and all but passed out.

The sun was westering into noon when the kitchen phone woke him, which was somewhat jarring, since it had been noon in Tanzania when they’d made it through the Door. He was still tired, but the fog of exhaustion had lifted from his mind.

He fumbled for the phone (an older model with a cord; the power went down so often that a cordless phone was basically useless), and nearly dropped the receiver. “Hello?”

“Christ, Pat, you sound like shit.”

“Geezer?”

“The one and only. Look, your sister and Ratiri are on their way. Make sure you feed ’em, and just ignore them looking like Death on a cracker.”

A small tendril of relief curled through Pat, though it was tempered by the oddness of Geezer’s tone. “What else?”

With a sigh, Geezer said, “Lorna’s...fuck, I don't want to talk about it over the phone. You’ll see when she gets there. Good luck, Pat.” He hung up before Pat could reply.

_ Fucking brilliant.  _ Well, sandwiches and tea could be managed, before he passed out again. There were two more ticked off of his list of People to Worry About, shortly to be safe at home.

His joints cracked slightly as he decided to be ambitious with some grilled cheese. Nobody else made them quite like he did, and there was something soothing about going through the motions. Sunlight streamed in through the kitchen window, and Lorna’s myriad prisms cast rainbows over walls, floor, and counter. Had it really been less than a day since he’d ushered so many people through a volcanic eruption in Tanzania? The contrast between where he stood and what he’d left was almost too surreal. He was pretty sure it was what Ratiri called ‘cognitive dissonance.’

The toaster held four slices of bread, so he popped them in before adding butter to the pan. He only filled one of the electric kettles (they had three, because there came a point that even their huge stovetop one couldn’t keep up with the amount of tea and hot cider the household drank). 

Busy hands only gave him time to think, however, and he wasn't sure he liked that. There was so much to do that the mere thought of doing any of it was almost enough to tip him back into unendurable weariness — at least anything likely to be his job would have to wait a while. He was a chloropath; they could send him back to Tanzania once they knew what the volcano’s final damage was. Until then, he’d look after the family — his and Mick’s, since Christ knew Mick and Siobhan were probably going to be run off their feet for the foreseeable future. Pat was almost ashamed that he was glad his own Gift was pretty useless right now.

He had four sandwiches and a pot of tea done by the time his sister and brother-in-law got home. They looked just about as bad as he’d expected, if not worse — Lorna’s bloody eyes were sure to feature in a few nightmares. The pair fell on their sandwiches like wolves, but Ratiri all but shoved Lorna into the shower before she could steal all the tea.

“Don't even ask,” he said, when Pat eyed him. “It might take a bloody week to get everyone sorted and relocated. We got taken to Madagascar and it was chaos there, too. I don't even want to think about how many people won’t make it out of Moshi at all.”

Quite honestly, Pat didn't, either. “Mick and Shiv are all right?”

“On the ship, along with Eris. Pat…” Ratiri sighed, and took a long draw at his tea. “Lorna knows where the person behind all this is. Lorna might well do something utterly horrible to her when we find her, so you and I have to be ready to deal with the fallout once she has.”

Because  _ that  _ sounded like fun. Lorna saved him the bother of having to come up with a reply, though — she padded into the kitchen with her hair wrapped in a towel, wearing flannel pajama trousers, and oversize T-shirt, and a plaid dressing-gown that came all the way down to her feet. Now that her face was clean, her eyes just looked worse, and he could see all the hair-fine blood vessels that had burst around them. 

“Drink this, Fun Size,” he said, and shoved a cup at her. He gave Ratiri a wave as the weary man headed for the shower himself. “Lorna, look at me.”

Look she did, over the rim of her cup. Jesus, that really  _ was  _ going to give him nightmares.

“Are you going to kill someone? I’m serious, Lorna. Are you going to do something you’re not going to be able to live with later?”

“No,” she said, after a somewhat dreadful pause, “I think I’ll be totally fine with what I’m going to do.”

 

~

 

It took a solid two days to process people through the Madagascar Door. Even though the most critically injured (and their families) were whisked away to hospitals around the country, it still left tens of thousands waiting.

The  _ Nezhiti  _ was wise enough to take its second load to Egypt — it could afford to, since its sister, the  _ Gremlin,  _ swooped in while it was on its return trip from Madagascar. The  _ Gremlin  _ was a smaller ship, but they still jammed it to capacity.

It was agreed that the  _ Gremlin  _ would head straight to Norway, and they could sort things out there — anyone who had family in other places could get sent through Norway’s Door. Lists would have to be compiled, and there was no telling how long that would take.

Mick, Siobhan, and Eris all got kicked off the  _ Nezhiti  _ morning of the second day, because they were almost too exhausted to move. Ratiri and Pat fetched them from the DMA, dropped Siobhan and Eris off at Siobhan’s house (with lunch and dinner pre-made), and left Mick with Saida. The Donovans were where they should be. Pat could breathe again.

Lorna had barely woken since she’d got home — she stirred for snacks, and to pee, but that was it. Ratiri said to let her sleep as long as she needed, because she’d pushed herself almost past the point of endurance, and he didn't want her giving herself an aneurysm.

“I thought we were meant to tell her when they caught the...person,” Pat said quietly. He and Ratiri had gone out onto the porch for a beer, though there was really no need to be so careful; Lorna was dead to the world. “I mean, Geezer called, didn't he?”

“He did,” Ratiri said, just as quietly, “but they’ve got the woman unconscious for now. She’s strong, Pat. Really strong. Lorna can’t be going up against her if she’s not running on all six cylinders.”

Pat wasn't tempted to argue. Having all of his family in one place (more or less) was such a blessing that he wasn't anxious to rock the boat. They were home. They were safe. Maybe it made him sound like an old woman, but that was all he could ask for.

On the morning of the third day, Lorna properly woke — when she came to breakfast, she wasn't just stumbling on auto-pilot. Her sclera had faded from red to assorted shades of rust and jaundice, which was almost even creepier. After two plates of scrambled eggs and toast, and three cups of tea, she actually seemed like a human.

“Did they find the one we’re after?” she asked, after a small burp.

Pat and Ratiri glanced at each other. Their table was currently jammed, because Mick, Saida, and both their children were still staying at the house. The twins and Saoirse had been keeping Zhara too busy to worry about her home, and Jamie was too young, but poor Saida had been subjected to aura-cleaning three times a day in an effort to stop her fixating on it. “They did,” Ratiri said. “She’s...asleep, for now. We can keep her under for a while yet, until you’re...ready.”

“Oh, I'm ready,” Lorna said. Her joints popped when she stretched. “I’m intrigued. Just let me get my bloody hair brushed.” The damp mass of it brushed the floor, which meant they had a good twenty minutes before she’d be ready to go.

“I’ll help,” Ratiri said. Her aura was going to get a pre-emptive cleaning, whether she liked it or not.

 

~

 

It was a beautifully sunny day, and the tunnels were jammed.

Ratiri had expected this, even if Lorna hadn't. The mountain wasn't equipped to take in huge numbers of refugees, but it took what it could — the sticky bit was keeping them fed. Everyone who had any spare room had a refugee or two living with them. It meant a large influx of groceries, however, as well as spare clothes and assorted other things. As a result, the ordinary stream of people had swelled into a river, and Lorna had to essentially use him as a human shield against the jostling. It was bad even once they got inside the DMA, and lasted until they reached the tram. 

The old DMA had had a monorail system, but this was not it. This was a cast-iron, Victorian monstrosity that had stuck when Sharley rebuilt the DMA’s time, and even if anyone had wanted to get rid of it, it would have been a nightmare. It was pretty, sure, but it was also ungainly, and nobody had managed to speed it up very much. They  _ had _ , at least, given it more comfortable seats, though the bright Baja fabric (some Mexican transfigurer had had quite a lot of fun with that one) didn't exactly match. The juxtaposition was weirdly charming, however.

As usual, the tram lurched like a drunk as it got underway, and Lorna leaned against him as they sat. There was no trace, yet, of that pale coldness he’d seen when she dug through the mind of that man. He feared that it would return soon enough — and what was more, her was certain Lorna feared it, too.

_ I trust you, mo chroí.  _ Perhaps she needed to hear it as much as he needed to say it.

She looked up at him, her good eye serious and almost sad.  _ I don't,  _ she said.  _ I don't think you should, either. I heard what Pat said — that someone set off Kilimanjaro on purpose. If they weren’t working for this bitch, I’d be really, really surprised. And if I’m right, allanah...if I’m right, I think I know exactly what I might do. And what terrifies me is that I don't care. Christ only knows how many people died in that eruption. _

She shut her eyes.  _ I don't want to not care what I might do, but I can’t make myself, and I know how fucking wrong that is. I know it’s a step toward being...what I don't ever want to be.  _ Who  _ I don't want to be. And I’m so afraid you’ll hate me later. _

Ratiri drew her closer, and kissed the crown of her head.  _ Lorna, I could never hate you. You’re mo chroí. Some things need to be done, no matter how awful, and you’re the only one who can do this. I know why you doubt, why you hesitate, and I’m telling you: don't hold back. If anyone should be afraid of you, it’s her. _

He paused, just a moment, half unable to believe what he said next.  _ And Lorna, if you do have to take a leaf out of Von Rached’s book, you’re the only one I'd trust to do it. You’re not him. You never will be, even if, just this once, you have to do an awfully good impersonation. I won’t hold it against you, and neither will anyone else. _

Lorna looked up at him again, and her gaze was as piercing as he’d ever seen it. She must have read the honesty in his face as well as his thoughts, for some of the tension left her.

_ I hope you’re right,  _ she said,  _ because there’s no turning back now. For me, or for her. I just hope I'll be able to look myself in the mirror tomorrow. _

_ If you can’t, I’ll just have to help you. _

He said no more, and neither did she. When they reached their stop, they passed through the corridors in silence, but Ratiri kept hold of her hand. He wasn't going to let go until he had to.

Lorna drew a deep breath as they approached the prison, and tried to center herself. She would do what she must, and would simply have to do her best not to enjoy it.

 

~

 

Julifer, Gavin, and Geezer had all just about collapsed in relief when Katje and Gerald made it back — yes, even Geezer. It allowed the three of them to actually get some  _ sleep _ ; by day two, all of them were as rested and refreshed as they were ever going to be.

Gerald had to hustle himself to the hospital, and Geezer, whose Gift was of the least used when dealing with their...prisoner, went with him. At least the War had given them all an unfortunate amount of practice at dealing with a massive influx of patients; busy as it was, it never quite descended into chaos.

Charlese had taken Miranda to the mountain this morning, so that she could play with the Donovan-Duncan kids in an environment that was familiar — and well away from the borderline mayhem in the DMA. It meant that Katje, dressed to kill in a maroon suit with matching lipstick, could stalk her way to the prison with confidence that her daughter was both safe and enjoying herself.

She hadn't yet told anybody outside the DMA that they’d caught the mastermind — hell, few people  _ in  _ the DMA knew. Nobody else was going to hear a word of it until Lorna had had a go at the bitch, and given them something to actually say.

Katje beat Lorna to the prison, although not by much. She’d been pondering how to do this, given their prisoner was so very dangerous; the woman was drugged right now, but she’d still managed to break the arm of a guard late last night, and nobody had managed to hit her with a second dose. Gerald had warned Katje that chemical restraints weren’t a long-term solution, mostly because the woman required such a high dose. Evidently, either her liver or her kidneys would sooner or later say Nope — it was just a matter of which did first.

This interview would determine much, but even it was difficult to orchestrate. It really wasn't safe for anyone else to be in the room, but Lorna was, well, Lorna. She’d only want someone there if she felt she could protect them, but she might want to go this alone. Katje suspected she might not want anyone else knowing what she was going to do. In that case, it might be best to leave her to it.

Lorna herself arrived before Katje could ponder it for long, and the sight of her made Katje twitch a bit. What the hell had happened to her eyes? She looked like a fucking zombie, albeit a fairly tidy one. 

As the Americans might say, yikes.

“You just let me go in on my own, Katje,” Lorna said. Her tone was so calm it was downright eerie. “You can talk to her when I’m done.”

Katje glanced at Ratiri, who gave her a barely perceptible nod. “All right. You call Ratiri if you need...anything, okay?”

Lorna’s expression suggested she wasn't going to need a damn thing. “I will,” she said. 

With not a little misgiving, Katje and a guard let Lorna into the cell. It was one of their stronger cells, designed to dampen quite a powerful Gift, and Katje had worried a bit that it might be too much even for Lorna. The only thing that eased her mind was the fact that if it came down to a physical fight, Lorna would win.

In her tiny friend went, and her expression was not one Katje was likely to forget any time soon — though God knew she’d try.

 

~

 

Lorna hadn't known what to expect from their prisoner, but this was not it.

The woman bound to the chair looked to be somewhere in her mid-to-late thirties, lean and fit, with a hard, pale face and a blunt, bleached bob. Her eyes were quite a dark blue, and some of the coldest Lorna had ever seen. Though her expression barely counted as one, there was a shocking amount of rage in the depths of those eyes. She might be a Von Rached wannabe, but she certainly lacked his detachment.

“Well,” Lorna said aloud, “ _ that’s  _ unfortunate.”

She sat, but the woman said nothing. Even bound in this iron cell, she exuded more raw power than Lorna had ever seen in anyone who wasn't herself or Von Rached (or the twins, not that she often let herself think of it). “Why’d you do it, lady? Your gobshite squad’s got all sorts’v motivations in various levels’v Stupid, but anyone as powerful as you ought to be smarter than that. If you know as much about Von Rached as I think you do, you’ve got to know about me, too — did you  _ really  _ think I’d let you get away with this? Or are you just as bad about underestimating me as he was?”

She didn't actually expect an answer, nor did she receive one — not right away, anyway. The prisoner must have practiced Von Rached’s ability to not blink, but nobody now living could out-stare Lorna. “You were supposed to die,” the woman said at last, with the faintest quirk of an eyebrow. She might have been found in Germany, but her accent was jarringly American. “Why do you think Kilimanjaro erupted?”

Lorna went very, very still. She’d been certain this bitch had been behind the eruption, but even she never could have imagined that. 

The woman smiled. “What, that surprises you? Von Rached went as far as he had to, to get what he wanted. Does that shock you?  _ You  _ might waste the strength of your Gift, but that doesn’t mean everyone else is going to.”

Still Lorna didn't move, nor did she speak. The level of wrath that rose within her was every bit as hot as the lahars she’d done her best to avert, because this bloody shreel had killed Christ knew how many thousands, and displaced hundreds of thousands more, all in an effort to kill  _ her _ ? She didn't want to believe it, and yet she had no reason not to.

_ Be still,  _ she thought, and still she was. The rage, the roaring in her ears — she took it, and she locked it away in a little box within her mind. “You utter fucking gobshite,” she said at last. “That storm, the first one? That was the result’v Von Rached  _ fucking up.  _ He never did get what he wanted — he never did destroy the DMA.”

“But I’ll do it for him,” the woman said.

Lorna’s eyebrows rose, because here was a level of arrogance she hadn't seen since...well, since Von Rached himself. “ _ For  _ him?” she echoed. Though only two words, they were very telling, and gave her a rather distasteful revelation. “For Christ’s sake, you’re not one’v those...those serial-killer wives, are you?”

The woman actually rolled her eyes. It was the first truly human thing she’d yet done. “Of course not. I’m not a groupie, like Candice, though I can’t say I’d say ‘no’ if he was alive to ask.”

Oh  _ ew _ ...Lorna’s nose wrinkled before she could help it. “He wouldn’t’ve listened even if you did,” she said blandly, since there was no one else to hear. “Go on, ask me how I know that.”

For the first time, the prisoner actually blinked. Something shifted in her expression, ever so minutely — was it uncertainty? Disappointment? Had Lorna just, in some way, marred this bitch’s mental image?

The thought made her smile. It was a small smile, and not at all a nice one, but it was a smile nonetheless. “He wasn't what you think he was. He wanted to destroy the DMA out of sheer pettiness — he had followers like you, hundreds of them, and you know what? You were all expendable. 

“Now, I know what you might be telling yourself — you’re a powerful telepath. A very powerful telepath, so surely you wouldn’t’ve been expendable, right? He’d’ve fucking made you  _ wish  _ you were. He’d’ve done to you what he did to me, and you’d be forced to live with it for the rest’v your life.”

Her adversary’s lips parted slightly, and her expression was so odd Lorna could put no real name to it. “I wouldn’t have fought him,” she said, with a scornful toss of her head. “He wouldn’t have had to force me to cooperate.”

With a sigh, Lorna leaned back in her chair, and wished, vaguely, that it wasn't so uncomfortable. “You dumb cunt,” she said. “You’re so off-base you might as well be on Mars. He wouldn’t’ve gone easy on you for cooperating — you wouldn’t’ve been spared the nasty shite. For Christ’s sake, the man fell in love with me, you twat,  _ and he did all that anyway.  _ Just what the fuck d’you think he would’ve done to  _ you _ ?”

Now, finally, there was a visible crack in the woman’s façade. Oh, her idol was falling off his pedestal, or Lorna would eat the boot she wasn't currently wearing. “You’re full of shit,” she said at last. “He was cold. I saw him, at the U.N. — he didn't lose it, no matter how you provoked him. He was powerful, and he was controlled, and I don't believe you.”

Okay, that explained a bit, though it was somewhat surprising that neither Lorna nor Von Rached had sensed this woman...unless she hadn't manifested her Gift yet.

“You don't have to believe me,” she said, with another sigh. “I was hoping you weren’t...well, such a disappointment. Enough’v this.”

_ The iron was a hindrance, and this woman’s telepathy really was shockingly powerful — her personal barrier was even stronger than the one she’d placed in the unfortunate Alex’s mind. Still, Lorna didn't hit it — again, she ghosted like smoke, ephemeral as the mist that sometimes wreathed the mountain. Her victim did not, at first, even register what she was doing...but when she did, she fought like a wild thing. The horror of mental invasion was one Lorna knew all too well, and she had no doubt at all that it had never happened to...to… _

Ashley,  _ she said.  _ Ashley, this won’t hurt if you don't struggle.

_ Ashley, naturally, did just that. She hit at Lorna with the full force of her Gift, now barely dulled by the drugs that had largely left her system. It hurt, but that sort of pain was hardly new to Lorna. God knew she’d endured enough of it at the Institute. _

_ The woman’s inner landscape was clinical, cold — what she imagined the Institute must have been like. She wasn't very far off the mark, either. At least her regimented, compartmentalized mind was easier to read, even if that made it all the more unpleasant. _

_ So cold, she was. Her idolization of Von Rached did not come from a wish to be like him. In many ways, she already  _ was  _ like him — or at least, like he’d been when Lorna met him. She lacked only his total disapassion; this was a woman who enjoyed hurting people purely for the sake of it. A woman who flexed her power to its full extent, and became nearly drunk on it. _

_ But why had she wanted to kill Lorna badly enough to commit genocide by volcano? Yes, Lorna was a danger to her, but that was...excessive. It was malicious in a way that did not suggest it was purely removal of an impediment— _

_ Oh. Well, that really was unfortunate. _

_ She’d found a memory, deep in a nondescript file cabinet. Ashley’s flat had, predictably, been very upscale, tasteful and expensive and strangely sterile. Naturally, the woman lived alone; people bored her, because their minds were all so pedestrian. _

_ Within this memory, she sat on her snow-white sofa, wine in hand, and watched one of the rare interviews Lorna had given since the War. An ugly ribbon of distaste swirled through Ashley’s mind, twining around the thought — the utter conviction — that Lorna did not deserve her strength, her power. It was wasted on her, who hid on her mountain and apparently did nothing with it. She was a waste of a person whose existence was pointless. _

_ Well. That was...interesting. It wasn't what Lorna had expected, but it also didn't surprise her. _

_ She left the memory, and rifled through a few more drawers. She didn't strictly  _ need  _ so much, but curiosity compelled her. If anyone was a waste of potential, it was Ashley, and Lorna couldn’t help but wonder how a person even wound up like this. Von Rached had been born a monster, but he was a pretty big outlier — most evil wasn't born, it was made. _

_ And yet Ashley’s mind yielded nothing that had not happened to hundreds of thousands of other people. The War had uprooted her, but she hadn't lost anyone, nor had she been injured. She’d worked as — surprise, surprise — a doctor, but nothing she had seen had ever troubled her. Before the War she’d been the only child of well-to-do parents, with an unremarkable life in the suburbs. There was no abuse, no trauma — not even any bullying. She hadn't been a popular child, but neither was she an outcast. A bright child, very bright, though not a genius; her life had been so thoroughly ordinary that...oh. Actually, that explained a lot. _

_ In this memory, fifteen-year-old Ashley lay on her bed, staring up at the ceiling. It was a warm summer night, and a faint breeze stirred the curtains. She was so desperately, desperately bored, so tired of her tedious life. Her family, her friends, her school, even she herself — it was all so relentlessly  _ ordinary _. She wanted to do something, anything, to set herself apart, but although she was good at many things, she had no one truly special talent. _

_ Lorna sat for a while, rather stunned. She would have  _ killed  _ for this woman’s childhood. At fifteen, she’d been living in a warehouse, for Christ’s sake. She’d spent her childhood in a house that could charitably be called a dump, with a father who had left all his children with permanent scars. This stupid bitch had had  _ everything _ , and she was a fucking ingrate who could only whine to herself that she wasn't  _ special.

_ The thought was so infuriating that Lorna had to pause for quite a while, occasionally bludgeoning Ashley’s consciousness when it fought too hard. Only once she was centered did she move again. _

_ Morbid curiosity drove her onward, because this woman’s mind so far hadn't given reason enough for her to do what she’d done. Ashley was a narcissist, sure, but nothing yet suggested she’d go so far as to kill hundreds of thousands of people just to take out  _ one  _ person. That was a level of evil few in human history could match, but this woman, selfish bitch though she was, was not Von Rached. She idolized him, but she  _ wasn't  _ him, no matter how much she told herself she wanted to be. How in the fuck had she gotten to this point? _

_ Once again, Lorna rifled through the files. By now she was causing Ashley actual pain, and she could not bring herself to care. The woman would take no actual damage from what she was doing; even yet, Lorna was careful. She had an ugly, icky suspicion that she couldn’t help but investigate, for all she was pretty sure she already knew the answer. _

_ As she’d taught all her telepaths, people might consciously lie to themselves, but you could always find the truth somewhere in their minds. The cabinet that was oh-so-helpfully labeled ‘Von Rached’ was disturbingly full — the top drawer barely budged. Inside it was...yep. Ew. Eeeew, people actually  _ did  _ that? _

What the  _ fuck,  _ Ashley?  _ she said, as she slammed the drawer shut. Brain bleach. She needed all the brain bleach in the fucking  _ world _ — and that was just one file. _

Fortunately for Ashley, Lorna twitched so hard she came back to herself. “Lady, you are  _ messed up _ ,” she said. “Seriously, what the fuck is wrong with you?”

Ashley, pale and wide-eyed, seemed to be too horrified to say anything. Had she really not thought Lorna could get into her head?

Lorna flopped back in her chair, and wished, vaguely, for an entire fifth of Fireball. “God, and I'm not even half done with you, either,” she groused. 

Finally, the woman managed to speak. “What — what else do you need?” A vein throbbed in her temple.

“Everything,” Lorna said. “Everything since you got your goddamn Gift, you...you moistened bint. There goes my entire day.”

“I...I could just tell you.” Were this woman anyone else, Lorna might have pitied her. Were she anyone else, Lorna might have felt even a brush of regret over what she was about to do.

“You’d just waste my time with lies,” she said. With a sigh, she hopped onto the table, and sat cross-legged. One small, brown hand caught Ashley’s chin, and her next words were as hard and cold as the ice on which she’d once died. “I’d tell you this won’t hurt, but I’d be lying.”

 

~

 

The number of people who lurked outside the cell door might have been comical, but they were all far too worried. There was no point in it; the cells were more-or-less soundproof, so they wouldn’t hear anything short of a scream. 

“How long is this gonna take?” Gavin asked quietly. He hadn't spent nearly this much time in anyone’s head, when he did his...interrogating. “Ratiri, what’s she doin’?”

“I...don't know. She’s shut the link.” Dread of a sort he hadn't felt in years seized his heart, because Lorna had never once closed it down — it had only ever been severed when he’d gone to the Other after the invasion of the DMA. Whatever she was doing, he was so, so afraid that none of his words would matter — that she would so loathe herself later there might be nothing he or anyone else could do.

“Did she shut it, or did that woman?” their guard asked. “I mean, that bitch is really, really strong, and Lorna’s…”

“Lorna’s got a Thing about her telepathy,” Gavin finished. “I don't care what she says, she might hesitate.”

“No, she won’t,” Ratiri said. “And that’s the problem.”

A piercing shriek, muffled by the heavy iron, made it through the door. Ratiri didn't manage to grab the guard before he wrenched it open, though at least he kept the idiot from rushing inside.

There wasn't any point anyway. The prisoner was completely immobile, her eyes blind and blank with terror, wide in her sweat-beaded face. Blood, obscenely bright against her pale skin, dripped from her nose, down onto the fingers that gripped her chin. There was no trace of arrogance in her, no smug superiority; nothing remained in her face or her aura save primal, nearly mortal horror.

A wide-eyed Gavin tried to force his way in, but Ratiri shoved him back — no small feat, given Gavin probably had a solid thirty pounds on him, and all of it muscle.

“You leave her be,” he said softly. “Everyone, just let her alone. Whatever she does in that room is going to stay there, do you hear me?”

Gavin stared at him. Ratiri was so chill most of the time that it was easy to forget he was capable of being...really not. “Ratiri...we’re still gonna need that bitch alive,” he said slowly. “Lorna can’t mush her brain to death.”

“She won’t,” Ratiri said, even as he shut the door. Lorna didn't seem to have noticed. “Haven’t you ever heard her say that the dead don't suffer?”

 

~

 

This was not what Ashley had expected. Not at all.

She’d done something very like it herself, and more than once — she was powerful, and wielded her power accordingly. Everyone she’d met had been at her mercy, when she’d bothered to have any. With Von Rached dead, she was supposed the be the only one who would dare to do it.

She knew — everyone knew — how unwilling Lorna was to really use her Gift. Lorna hid on her fucking mountain, and she taught all her telepaths that the best thing to do with telepathy was not use it. Ashley had had to teach herself, because there was no way she was going to let the DMA know she existed — not until she was willing to reveal herself, before she ended it. Lorna’s inhibitions, her morality, her scruples hobbled her; she could have ruled the DMA, but through some deficiency of character she refused. Ashley had thought it a form of spinelessness, a weakness to be exploited. She was so, so wrong.

Ashley had read all sorts of accounts of Von Rached — his detachment, his inhuman coldness — and she’d thought she had a good enough mental image of just what that must have been like. She was wrong  _ there _ , too; she hadn't known what cold inhumanity was until she found herself staring into Lorna Duncan’s eyes. The woman’s telepathy was tidy, efficient, and utterly without mercy, and the agony it seared through Ashley’s head was somehow all the worse for not being deliberate. Unlike Ashley had so blithely done to others, Lorna wasn't deliberately hurting her — she simply didn't care that her relentless digging was almost more than Ashley could bear.

“Oh God, don't kill me,” she whimpered. Tears of pain and terror leaked down her cheeks, hot as the blood that ran from her nose. “Please, please don't kill me.”

“I’m not going to kill you, Ashley,” Lorna said. Her voice was flat, inflectionless, and so frigid Ashley would have recoiled if she’d been able. “By far the worst’v your crimes were committed against the people’v Tanzania. You’re going to be alive, healthy, and whole, so they can decide what to do with you. Whatever they decide, we won’t stand in their way.”

“But—” Ashley tried.

“Shhh,” Lorna soothed. “It’ll all be over soon. You’ll be just fine.”

Ashley wished she could believe that.


	9. Chapter Nine

Sharley could not say she was pleased to have her vacation interrupted. She was even less pleased when she found out  _ why _ .

She’d made her way to New Echo, rather than try to get Marty to come to her. Once upon a time she would have gone around Old Echo, because even though its infestation of Memories could no longer hurt her, the fact remained that Marty had died there, and those things had killed her. They’d killed Sharley, too; it had just taken her longer to die.

But the Memories were no more, thanks to the Lady, and a strange impulse even Sharley could not explain led her to walk through that dead, deserted town. She really shouldn’t waste time doing it — logically, she ought to haul her ass back to Earth, pronto — but instinct told her to go through Old Echo, and she’d learned long ago not to ignore it.

It was beyond strange. It was still a place of dust and shadows and silence, but the stone of its empty streets no longer exuded crippling dread. Now there was merely sadness, because once it had been a living, bustling town, but now it was no longer even a tomb. Sharley didn't know how the Memories disposed of the bodies of those they killed, but disposed of they were.

Its lines of Time sat undisturbed, and she hesitated to touch them. She’d seen much of the Other’s history, and it was so horrible she had no desire to see any more. Once it had been a living, green, pleasant land, even after her father came and set up shop in his gloomy fortress. Things had ticked along fine, until he brought Akathisia, and turned the Other into a decent impersonation of hell.

Akathisia was dead now, and her daughter wiped out of Time, but the damage they had done endured. Maybe it always would. That the Other had been repaired into its current state bordered on the miraculous.

So far as Sharley knew, one of the first things Akathisia had done was set off a massive volcano, far past what was now the ever-shifting Edge of the Real. The Other was a much bigger place than even most of its inhabitants realized — it was just that now, so little of it was actually habitable. Hell, there were areas even  _ Jary  _ wouldn’t go, and that was one of them. It wasn't until Jary had gone to Earth that she’d had any real context for what ‘volcano’ meant, in this case; Sharley had thought it must have been like Vesuvius, or Krakatoa, but nope, apparently it was the Other’s equivalent of the Yellowstone Caldera. No wonder the climate was still so fucked.

_ Why does that feel important?  _ Sharley wondered. It was natural that what was happening on Kilimanjaro might remind her of the Other’s own eruption, but intuition insisted there was more to it, even if it refused to offer any clue as to just what that ‘more’ might be.

 

~

 

Lorna didn't know how long she dug through Ashley’s head, but by the time she was finished, she desperately needed to pee. Goddamn tea.

For quite a while, however, she sat still, eyes closed. Ashley wasn't going to cause her any trouble; the woman was all but catatonic. A healer could fix that later, but for now, Lorna didn't dare summon one. She didn't dare move.

This,  _ this  _ was why she didn't use her telepathy for anything but communication. It was downright intoxicating — she floated on a high more intense than any drug had ever given her, buoyed by a dizzying euphoria. The strength of her own magic surged through her veins, fighting her rationality, what few of her ethics she hadn't yet broken. Magic wanted to be used; once that gate was open, it was very, very hard to shut it again. 

This was what Von Rached must have felt every day, given how casually he flexed his Gift. It would be so, so easy to become addicted to it. Lorna well knew it, too, which was why she was so adamant in her training of all the other telepaths: it could take over a person’s life if allowed. She wanted to keep going, and not just with Ashley — she wanted to plumb the minds of all she knew, but that was not really  _ her  _ desire. It was the telepathy, begging to be fed now that it had finally been granted a true meal.

_ No,  _ she told herself, told it.  _ I’m not Von Rached, and I'm not going to be.  _ She hoped like hell this never proved necessary again, because she wouldn’t dare do it. That way lay a path she would kill herself before she trod.

Somehow, she had to go and face the others. She had to let them see what she had done to this woman. She’d wiped the blood from Ashley’s face, at least, but there was nothing to be done about her vacant-eyed stare, or the shadows beneath her eyes, or the chilly, clammy pallor of her skin. Lorna had done that — she’d reduced another human being to a mental shell, and no matter how awful a person Ashley was, Lorna had to live with that for the rest of her life.

And still, even now, she wasn't sorry. Not yet. Maybe, God help her, not ever. She regretted the necessity, and she certainly regretted having to witness so much of that monster’s thoughts and memories, but what she’d done to get them? No, she couldn’t bring herself to care, because to truly use her Gift was exhilarating in a way nothing else had ever been. And that terrified her. She knew, with awful clarity, what she could so easily become.

So she sat still, and let that euphoria pass into something that wouldn’t be blatantly obvious to everyone who knew her. Dispassion was alien to her, but she had to summon something close to it.

Nobody could be allowed to know that she’d enjoyed this. Ever. 

There would be no keeping it from Ratiri, but he at least believed that it wouldn’t revolt him. Lorna could only pray he was right. Everyone else, though...she knew how they’d look at her.

Finally, her ever-more-insistent bladder forced her to move. Both her feet had fallen asleep, so she stumbled a little when she hopped off the table, and had to stand still long enough to regain some feeling in them. Thankfully, Ashley was in no state to notice Lorna use her toilet, because having a wee with someone else in the room was just too weird.

_ Breathe, Lorna,  _ she told herself, as she washed her hands.  _ You did what you had to do, and you were as careful as you could be. And you’re never going to do it again. _

The cell had no mirror, so she had no real way of knowing how awful she might or might not look. She carded her hands through her fringe anyway, in an attempt to make it half-arse presentable before she rapped on the door.

It cracked open, and she almost sagged with relief when she saw only the guard and Ratiri on the other side. The rest must have got sick of waiting, or maybe Ratiri sent them away; either way, it was much easier to leave that cell not having to face them all.

“She needs a healer,” she said, and deliberately did not examine his or the guard’s expressions. “I was careful, but I had to dig deep.”

Ratiri drew her close. “Did you get what you needed?”

“And more than I ever wanted,” she sighed. “I didn't want to believe people like her actually existed. Not anymore, after everything the world’s gone through.”

Ratiri glanced over her head, and forced himself not to tense. The prisoner sat limp as a corpse in her chair, her head lolled back. Empty, glassy eyes shone in the harsh fluorescent light, blank as a doll’s, as a Memory’s. She looked like a discarded toy, so totally devoid of animation that he would have thought her dead if he couldn’t see her aura. The salty-copper scent of blood tickled at his nose, and he spotted the rusty-flakey remnants of a nosebleed around her nostrils.

Dear bloody God, what had Lorna done to her?

It was not a question he could ask — not when his wife was so obviously stricken. “Mo chroí, will you be able to tell the others what you saw?”

Her head shook against his chest. “Only Katje and Geezer,” she said. “Gerald too, if he can get away from the hospital.”

_ Only people who were at the Institute,  _ he thought.  _ Only people who might understand what she did. _

“I’ll call Pat, and have him boot everybody for a while,” he said. “They can go to Siobhan’s house, and harass her after work. We can make pie for dinner.”

Again she nodded, and he kissed the crown of her head. To the guard, he said, “Don't pass this around. Not a word of it, do you hear me?”

He hadn't intended to put so much vehemence into his tone, but the guard paled. “I won’t. I’ll...get a healer.”

“Call Siobhan Donovan.” Siobhan wouldn’t go blabbing what she saw here. “She’s probably at the hospital.”

The poor man nodded, and Ratiri led his wife away. He didn't fear her and he never would, but he’d bet precious few other people could say the same. The two of them stopped only long enough for him to place a call to Pat, who agreed to inflict the rest of the household on Siobhan.

Poor Lorna said nothing as he led her back through the hallways, and then onto the tram. Neither were any less busy than they had been this morning, but now the crowd was infused with a higher number of Tanzanian refugees — small groups led around by DMA residents. Last time Ratiri had checked, the mountain had stopped erupting, but that didn't mean anyone was going home. Many no longer had a home. Knowing that, and seeing all these poor dispossessed people, made it rather hard to have any sympathy for the woman Lorna had all but destroyed.

Even once they were in the tunnels, Lorna stayed silent. Her aura was leaden with misery, and he picked at it as they walked, for all the good it did; the grey didn't lessen, no matter how he pulled it. All he could do was keep hold of her, and hope it was enough to keep her from getting lost in her own mind.

They emerged from the tunnels into a lazy, golden, sunny afternoon, that seemed downright jarring after the scene they’d left behind. Bees buzzed among the roses on the arbor above the sliding-glass door, and their rich scent hung sweet in the air. All was warm and calm, and quiet save for the distant calling of birds. He felt Lorna relax a little, which allowed him to in turn.

Even once in their bright kitchen, Ratiri didn't actually let go of her — not until three screaming cats tore into the room, demanding attention. She knelt to pet them, and he used the opportunity to turn the kettle on. Tea never hurt anything, and if she needed a few drops of what she called her ‘tincture’ (also known as oil of marijuana), so be it. At this point, he’d give her whatever he thought might help.

What worried him was that even now, she said nothing. Mairead’s black, fluffy cat had clambered onto her shoulder and burrowed under her braid, but all she did was pet the cat, over and over. Ratiri hesitated to try to make her speak, but at the same time, he feared it was now or never.

He sat facing her, while the little tortie known as Boo promptly claimed his lap. “Talk to me, mo chroí,” he said. “Nobody else ever needs to know what you say, but don't keep it bottled in there.” Gently, he tapped her forehead with his forefinger.

Her hand took his, interlacing their fingers. “You know how shit I am with words,” she whispered. “I can’t tell you allanah, but I can show you, and hope you don't wind up as afraid’v me as I am’v myself.”

Ratiri gently set Boo aside, and pulled his wife onto his lap (shoulder-cat and all). He didn't know of any other way to prove to her that he was not, nor would he ever be afraid of her.

_ Lorna had shown him quite a lot of things over the years, so he was fully used to the way this worked; seeing through her eyes, and experiencing her thoughts, wasn't any kind of shock. Her wrath at Ashley was no surprise, though  _ that  _ worried him a bit, just because she hadn't let it get anywhere — it had to discharge sooner or later, but now was not the time. _

_ No, Lorna’s actions were nothing he had not expected. She’d taken what care she could, and she had inflicted no deliberate torment — there had been no actual viciousness in anything she’d done, for all she’d been so disgusted with the woman.  Ashley’s terror and inevitable pain meant nothing to her, but none of it was done of malice aforethought. _

_ That she cared nothing for it was likewise unsurprising, because there was no reason why she should. Ashley had likely killed tens of thousands of people, and it might take decades for the lands around Kilimanjaro to recover, even with the aid of the Gifted. This was nothing the woman hadn't brought on herself, but to Lorna, her own attitude was almost too like Von Rached to be borne. _

Mo chroí, you are not him,  _ Ratiri said.  _ I’ll tell you this every day for the rest of your life, if I have to.

Allanah, you don't know yet,  _ she said.  _ You don't know all’v it. You need to know what I felt.

_ He’d had no idea just how much she’d been holding back, because the sudden surge of sheer, elemental power coursing through him all but stole his breath. Fierce as a hurricane, brilliant as lightning, it jagged electric through the very core of his being. It was a staggering, nearly overpowering torrent of raw magic, and yet within Lorna’s memories, he felt it temper. She wielded it with all the precision of a surgeon, even as her instinct fought against such control. What she wanted — really wanted — was to crush Ashley’s psyche into so much dust, to enact pseudo-divine vengeance like the god her power made her feel she was. _

_ But even caught amid it — even overwhelmed as he nearly was — Ratiri felt the terror in her. He understood why she so feared herself, because only now was he fully aware just what his wife could do, if she chose. And at the root of that fear was the knowledge that none on this Earth could stop her. _

Sharley could, mo chroí,  _ he said.  _ Sharley could stop anyone, but she won’t have to. You aren’t Von Rached. You aren’t your father. I know you want to hang onto this, but I also know you can give it up.

_ Her answering thought was outright desperate.  _ It doesn’t scare you?  _ I  _ don't scare you?

_ At this point, Ratiri saw no reason at all to conceal what it really did to him.  _ Actually, it’s a hell of a turn-on, and I would desperately like to make use of the fact that we have the house to ourselves.

Lorna blinked up at him, and he came back to himself. “Seriously?” she asked, dubious.

In answer, he kissed her...and pushed the cat off her shoulder.

 

~

 

Siobhan stared at the human-shaped vegetable sat in front of her, and wondered just what the fuck she was supposed to do about it.

Physically, the woman was mostly just totally exhausted. Pulse was good, respiration was good, blood pressure was a touch high, but not dangerously so. Mick had taught Siobhan how to take and read vitals, and this Ashley-woman’s were all within healthy range. And yet she was a vegetable. Her unblinking eyes had been so creepy that Siobhan had forced them shut, because there was nothing going on behind them. The lights were on, but nobody was home. Siobhan wasn't sure there was anyone left to  _ come  _ home.

_ Jesus, Fun Size,  _ she thought, a bit helplessly.  _ What the fuck did you do? _

Even yet, she didn't quite understand how her own Gift worked, but obviously everything was a lot easier when a person’s ailment was, well,  _ obvious.  _ Even when it wasn't, she’d learned to detect certain things over time — cancer especially, since that could hide for years without showing any symptoms. She knew the dangerous weakness of aneurysm, and that was what she searched for now.

What she found was...appalling. An aneurysm would have been better — or at least, easier — than the scores of fine, tiny capillary bleeds scattered throughout the woman’s brain. Siobhan didn't know just which centers did what, but she did know that this bit, the prefrontal something, stored long-term memories. Ashley’s was riddled with bleeds so small they were almost microscopic.

_ I am so not qualified to deal with this.  _ She’d have to do what she could, but this woman wasn't going to get fixed up overnight. She’d take care of the things that would be most likely to make another healer stop and say ‘what the fuck?’, but she was hardly the most expert healer the DMA had. 

“And bitch, I can’t even feel sorry for you,” she sighed, and set to work. She had twenty minutes before she was supposed to stop and take a break; snacks were mandatory to keep up her energy, because Mick still refused to let her live down knocking herself out during the flu pandemic after the War.

She was just about done when Katje opened the door, and scared half the life out of her. “How is she?”

Siobhan somehow didn't choke on her sandwich. “Well, her brain’s not oatmeal,” she said. “You’d need a healer who was actually a doctor to tell you just what Fun Size really did to her. Little brain bleeds, mostly, but I think she’ll be fine. Probably.”

Katje stepped inside, and eyed Ashley. She still had on her maroon suit, though her lipstick had faded. “I have been talking with the Tanzanian government,” she said. “They want to put her on trial, and I agree, but she is so strong that will not be easy. Unless I can convince Lorna to go to Tanzania with her, they will have to come to the DMA for the trial.”

With a snort, Siobhan said, “Good luck there. You wouldn’t be able to pry her out with a crowbar, and I don't blame her. I’m sure Lorna’ll have a list’v her accomplices soon, so at least you can hand them that. If they can’t get Bitchtits right off, at least they can have some terrakinetics to chew on.”

Katje’s eyebrows rose. “Bitchtits?”

“She’s a bitch and her tits are fake,” Siobhan said. “So, Bitchtits.”

Katje dissolved into giggles before she could help it. “Donovans,” she said. “I should not laugh, but...really? They’re fake? Good work.”

“Much good though they’ll do her. Katje, realistically, there’s only two real options for dealing with this twat, aren’t there? Human veggie or execution?”

Sighing, Katje sat in the free chair. “Yes,” she said. “We have never executed anyone in the DMA, and I am hoping Tanzania will call for it so we don't have to.”

Siobhan finished her sandwich in two large bites. “Have they got the death penalty?” 

“They do, and I can’t imagine they won’t want it. If they don't she will be, as you say, a human veggie.” With a shrug, Katje added, “Or a transmutationer could turn her into an ape, but that would be a whole other ball of wax on a slippery slope.”

“I wouldn’t think a ball’v wax would slip very well,” Siobhan mused. “Maybe if you put it on a sled first.” Morbid curiosity led her to flick the end of Ashley’s nose, but the woman was still dead to the world. “Pat thinks she was one’v those groupies — you know, like the prison-wives. I know they’re out there.”

“Maybe,” Katje said. “I doubt it’s that simple, but maybe. Some people like what they know they can’t have — and some of those like the evil people. I spent years learning about what people want, but also why they want it.  Most men, they want sex. I found women are more complex. Ashley here, she is beautiful, and she can’t be stupid. She could probably have any man she wanted, but sometimes a thing that is too easy doesn’t seem worth having.”

“Did you see it that way?” Siobhan asked. “The easy bit, I mean?”

Katje leaned back in the chair, and toed her shoes off. “I think, maybe yes. Gerald, at the Institute — I offered as payment for looking after me, and he said no. He said to wait until we knew each other better, because he wasn't after anything — it wasn't why he protected me. Nobody ever said ‘no’ before. At first I wanted because he was attractive and kind, but I only thought about physical things. When he said ‘no’, that was when I really stopped and looked at all of him. I never thought I would marry anyone, because I liked my job, and I couldn’t imagine just being with one person. Maybe Ashley never found that one because she never stopped to look at all of anyone. Shame,” she added dryly. “She’s hot. She would have made a good escort. You definitely meet people that way.”

Siobhan found herself laughing before she could help it. “No, instead she probably had the hots for someone who’d’ve...hell, was Von Rached even into women, really? Men? Sheep? MRI machines?”

Katje massaged her forehead. “Should I tell you why people are sometimes attracted to somebody who would probably hurt them?”

“I shouldn’t be curious, but I am.”

“Usually it is because they are submissive. You might be surprised at who is a sub, too,” Katje said. “One of my clients was a very successful banker, the kind of man that in English you’d call an alpha. I was his dominatrix. Sometimes, people like that, who are so competitive and everything, secretly want to let go for a while. Give someone else control. And sometimes there are people who would only daydream. 

“Von Rached liked women, but I think not enough to...really do anything about it, unless it was on offer.” Katje couldn’t say she was surprised Lorna had never told Siobhan about...that whole mess. “Men, I don't know. Sheep, definitely not, but doctors can be weird about machines. I think Gerald is a little in love with one particular CT machine — I caught him petting it once.”

“At least that was all he was doing,” Siobhan said. So far as she knew, Katje really didn't speak much about her former life and...profession. “That you know’v.”

Katje arched an eyebrow. “Oh, I would know. I think it is maybe the empathy, but Gerald is a terrible liar. He blushes from his hair to his feet, and while it is harder to see than it would be on someone pale like me, it is there. He is like a brick, rather than a lobster.”

“Jesus, I need a man,” Siobhan said. “Haven’t dated since Eris’s da, the bastard. Maybe I’ll meet a nice Tanzanian who can actually handle a Donovan infestation.” Discussing men while sitting in the same room as a human lump like Ashley probably ought to have felt wrong, but after the last three days, a little normalcy was a wonderful thing. “How’d you...do your job? Have it off with somebody you didn't care about? I had a one-night stand or two, but that was it. Too much chance’v something going wrong, and it felt pretty empty, honestly.”

Katje considered this for a while. “Because until I met Gerald, sex was...sex. It didn't mean anything. It was business. I was friends with my clients, but it was only that. And how...I just really like sex. Some people do. It was Gerald who showed me there could be more to it than that.” 

She smirked. “Maybe Ashley just really needed to get laid. I had a client once who looked like her, except, you know, not a bitch. And her tits were real.”

“And she probably wasn't a genocidal maniac.”

“That too. Even Von Rached had not gone that far...when I met him, at least.”

Siobhan stared at her. “You and him — really?” Her nose wrinkled in distaste. No, the man wasn't exactly hard on the eyes, but he’d been so, so  _ creepy _ . The natural instinct of any sane person should have been  _ avoid. _

“It was business — I got things to make life more comfortable — but I also had a guess he would not do the bad experiments,” Katje said. “Lorna once told me that I am like a man in one way: I can turn off any emotional...anything...for that. Or at least, I could. 

“If I had been older, I don't think I would have dared. I took a gamble that he would not, you know, beat me or anything, and I was so young that the possibility occurred to me, but I...guess I did not take it seriously? I was confident I could manipulate, but now that I am older, I think he let me think that was what I was doing. And I think the only reason he didn't do the bad experiments later is because I was his leverage to make Gerald behave. He told Gerald he would leave me alone if he didn't try to interfere with...things.” She couldn’t be any less vague than that.

“Dunno how you lot survived in there,” Siobhan said. “I’d’ve gone barking.”

“Many people did,” Katje sighed. “Some have never all the way recovered. I know Gerald and I both still have nightmares sometimes, and I’m sure the others do, too. But of course you would have survived, Siobhan,” she added, with a roll of her eyes. “You are a Donovan. You are all like cockroaches — tiny and impossible to kill, even with a nuke.”

“Thanks, I think.” Groaning slightly, Siobhan scrubbed a hand over her face. “We’ve got to go see what Fun Size got out’v Genocidal McBitchtit’s head, don't we?”

“Not you,” Katje said, shaking her head. “Lorna wants only people who were at the Institute with her. Who saw what she became there.”

“I wish she wouldn’t be afraid to let us know,” Siobhan said. “We’ve never been afraid’v her, Katje, even when she went Blank. Pat and I, we were afraid  _ for  _ her, because we were pretty sure she’d kill somebody someday, but if she thinks we’d ever judge what goes on in her head, she’s away with the fairies.”

Katje blinked. “That one I have not heard.”

“It means ‘crazy’.”

“Oh. Well, that is a complicated thing and now is not the time to ask her. Maybe later, when her head is not full of Genocidal McBitchtit.”

“That’s what she said.”

 

~

 

Lorna was quite a lot happier — or at any rate, more relaxed — by the time Katje, Gerald, and Geezer got to the house that evening. At their age, she and Ratiri didn't get up to bedroom shenanigans as often as they once had, but that didn't make it any less fun when they did. Even if she was pretty sure she’d strained something in her back. Oops.

She helped him make a simple dinner of kielbasa casserole and mashed potatoes, because they were feeding a number of people and one of them was Geezer, who Ratiri had once dubbed a food Hoover. Beer, water, and cider rounded it out; they wouldn’t have fresh vegetables for a while yet.

The cats, naturally, wove between their feet, investigating everything and hoping someone would drop something. The sun set gold and crimson through the trees, the North Star hung in the purpling sky, and they were at home. They were where they belonged, and like hell would Lorna leave for anywhere but the DMA ever again. Their holiday had, in fact, been an utterly shit idea, and if not for the fact that they’d saved many lives, she’d have wished they’d never gone.

_ Kilimanjaro wouldn’t have erupted if you hadn't gone. _

The thought was not one she needed, but there was no getting rid of it now. It was true, too; the only reason Ashley’s people had triggered it was because Lorna was there. 

“Your aura just shifted,” Ratiri said. “I see grey.”

She sighed. “Allanah, those people only died because I was there. And I know that’s not my fault, but Jesus, how can I live with that?”

He took her by the shoulders, very gently. “Mo chroí, nobody is going to blame you for that, and you shouldn’t blame yourself. That woman is a lunatic — if you hadn't gone to Tanzania, she would have found some way to set off half the volcanoes in the Cascades in the hope that it blew up this mountain.”

“Christ, there’s a thought,” Lorna said. “I wish you didn't have a point. I didn't think anybody outside paid me any mind. I did my best to disappear.”

Ratiri drew her close. She was so much shorter than him that he couldn’t even rest his chin on top of her head. “You helped save the world,” he said. “That’s not something people forget, but you’re not responsible for anyone else’s actions.”

There came a rap at the sliding-glass door, saving her from having to respond. Normally people just barged on in, but this time Katje stood on the other side and waved. She’d ditched her suit for jeans and a red halter top, and she had a very large pie in her hands.

Lorna scurried to let her in, and inhaled the scent of apple. “You’re a saint, you are.”

“Not in this shirt, I’m not. Gerald is right behind me — he told me to hurry before the pie gets cold.”

“We’ll just pop it in the oven to keep warm.” Ratiri took it from her, and carefully did just that. “Where did you get apples?”

“Julifer. She can find anything.”

_ That  _ was easy to believe. “Did you see...well, her?” Lorna asked quietly.

Katje actually rolled her eyes. “I did,” she said. “Your sister calls her Genocidal McBitchtits.”

Unfortunately for Ratiri, he’d taken a sip of cider; naturally, he choked on it.

“Somehow that doesn’t surprise me,” Lorna said, as she thumped her husband on the back a few times. “She’s...not dead? Bitchtits, I mean?”

“Siobhan says she will recover. But screw her — how are you?”

Lorna sighed. “As good as I’m going to be,” she said. “I didn't like what I found in her head, though I can’t say a whole lot’v it surprised me.”

“Anything interesting?” Gerald said, as he stepped through the door and kicked off his shoes. Geezer, bearing beer, was right behind him.

“Yes and no. Appalling, mostly...she was the biggest case of wasted potential I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Food was dished up before any more was. Sitting at the table in her bright, cozy kitchen helped Lorna more than she might have expected. It was a far cry from the sterile iron cell.

She laid out what she’d seen of Ashley and her motivations, and shook her head anew at how ordinary the woman’s origins were. “I just don't get it,” she said, as she speared a piece of kielbasa with her fork. “Her parents loved her. They were kind to her, and supported her in everything she ever wanted to do...I was expecting some kind’v abuse, or...something.”

“Narcissistic Personality Disorder,” Gerald said. “They’re not capable of loving anyone. In their minds, the world revolves around them, and they can do no wrong.”

“Yeah, that sounds like Bitchtits. I made a list’v her terrakinetics, on the chance any’v them even made it out. I’ll show them to Saoirse, and have her knock some Wanted posters together.”

Katje hesitated. “How did she know so much? About the DMA, about where you were going?”

“That,” Lorna sighed, “is nastier than I’d thought. Bitch had studied everything Von Rached ever did, at least that anybody really knew about. She knew what he’d done with Jameson, but she was even sneakier than that. 

“She knew we’d catch another Jameson, so instead she hung out in London, and tapped one’v our known, cleared telepaths while he was out and about. We don't check everybody every single time they go in and out’v a Door, but this thing was so subtle I doubt most’v our Door-guards would’ve caught it. The woman might be an asshole, but outside’v me and Von Rached, she’s the most powerful telepath I’ve ever seen.”

Katje’s utterly horrified expression would have made her laugh, if the subject hadn't been so dark. Lorna didn't need to read her mind to know that she was turning over the thought of just what a nightmare extra screening would be.

“I wouldn’t be that worried, Katje,” Lorna said. “I really doubt there’s anybody else out there who could do this, even if they’d thought to. I severed her link to poor Roger, and I’ll dig what’s left out’v his head later — not that there’s much to dig. It was purely passive; she couldn't have killed him like Von Rached tried with Jameson.”

She shook her head. “I’d thought she must’ve wanted to be like Von Rached, but she already was, just...not nearly as smart. Not stupid, but not a genius. She resented him that, and she resented me my power, and I don't understand  _ why _ . She’s bright, she’s gorgeous, she’s incredibly powerful, and all she could focus on was that she wasn't more. She could’ve done so much good, and instead she sets off a volcano and kills Christ knows how many people, all because she wants me dead. It’s fucking infuriating. Why couldn’t she be like Gavin?”

“That’s possibly easy,” Gerald said. He was on his second helping of casserole, though he had yet to catch up with Geezer, who was closing in on his third. “He has the same reasons as you, really. He grew up poor, without guidance — he knows what suffering is, because he’s seen it and he’s endured it. Yes, he’s powerful now, but both of you know what it’s like to be totally powerless.”

That had occurred to Lorna before, but she wouldn’t have connected it to Ashley. “And just like Von Rached, Bitchtits grew up with everything. Hell, she has even less excuse — Von Rached’s mother beat him when he was little, until she wound up too afraid’v him. Ashley barely even got scolded, and she’s bright enough that while she did have to work for her grades, she didn't have to work that hard. 

Frowning, she speared another kielbasa. “But...but that sounds too simple. Gerald, Ratiri, you had normal childhoods, and I know Katje’s wasn't conventional, but yours was happy, too. None’v you turned out like Von Rached or Ashley.” Geezer had no memory of ever having  _ been  _ a child, so neither he nor anyone else had any way of knowing if it had been stable or not.

“We’re not narcissists,” Gerald said. “That’s what sets them apart.”

“Yeah, but Von Rached wasn't, either,” she said. “I mean, not all the way. He might’ve hated the fact that he actually cared about other people, come the finish, but he couldn’t get rid’v it. In his own selfish, fucked-up way, he experienced actual emotional growth, but I don't think Ashley ever has or ever would.”

Ratiri was honestly surprised Lorna would acknowledge Von Rached had done any growing. She’d so adamantly tried to ignore and deny it in the days before he’d died. “Ashley also wasn't nearly as old,” he pointed out. “Actually, how old is she?”

“Thirty-seven,” Lorna said. “Surprised me, because she looks younger. You’ve got a point, though. Von Rached probably wouldn’t have been able to learn shit at her age.”

Katje sipped at her wine, and ignored the cat that sat staring at her, hopeful of a dropped morsel. “Siobhan and I think she just needed to get laid,” she said. “You think she was a waste of magic, but I think she was a waste of beauty. In the right shoes, she could have had the world at her feet.”

Lorna’s nose wrinkled. “Yeah, don't even ask me what she had in her mental spank bank. She never found a boyfriend because she never found anyone who measured up to her expectations. Nobody enough like her, as if that even matters.” She and Ratiri were very different people, as were Katje and Gerald, and yet she thought their relationships were all the stronger for it. Even yet, they discovered new things about each other; it was impossible to get bored.

One of Katje’s eyebrows rose. “Let me guess,” she said. “He who should not be named?”

“Yup,” Lorna said, with a grimace. “Pat was right — serial-killer wife, only not as simple. What’s going to happen to her, now that I’m done with her? Tanzania?”

“Trial, and then whatever they decide,” Katje said. “I don't suppose I could get you to go with her to Tanzania, and keep an eye on her through a trial?”

Lorna’s expression was all the answer she needed.

“Thought so,” she said, rather glumly. She wasn't looking forward to telling the Tanzanian government that, but she’d already figured she’d have to. “We just don't have anyone else who could control her.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.” Behind her there was suddenly a Sharley, where no Sharley had been a moment before.

Katje was not the only one who choked; Geezer wheezed as well. “ _ Dammit _ Sharley, wear a fucking bell,” he managed.

“Now where’s the fun in that?”


	10. Chapter Ten

It didn't take long to fill Sharley in on the entire mess, and her expression grew grimmer by the moment. The woman could pull off tranquil rage like nobody else Lorna had ever seen in her life.

“Oh, I’ll take her to Tanzania,” she said. There was a storm in her mismatched eyes that Lorna would never, ever want directed at her. “She can sit there lucid and aware, because if she thinks she can slip past me, she’s gonna have a very, very bad day.”

A shiver crept its way up Lorna’s spine. It was easy to forget that Sharley was, at least technically, a deity. Living alongside her, anymore they tended to forget she wasn't properly alive; she was just...Sharley. Calm, quiet, with that odd air of stillness that somehow persisted even when she moved. It made the reminders of what she really was all the more jarring.

“Are you gonna be able to go testify, though?” Sharley asked. “Tanzania’ll be out for blood, but we’ve gotta prove that this asshole’s the actual culprit, or it’ll just be a kangaroo court.”

_ “Why’s it called a kangaroo court?”  _ Layla asked.  _ “Are there actual kangaroos?” _

Lorna wondered how bored Sharley’s voices had been, in the Other — there was nothing new or unfamiliar for them there. “I...don't know, actually. Anyone know why a kangaroo court’s called that?” Nobody else in the room could hear Sharley’s voices, after all.

“Nobody does,” Gerald put in. “It’s one of those things that might have any number of origins.”

_ “Well, fuck,”  _ Kurt grumbled.  _ “D’you know, a kick from a kangaroo can disembowel a grown man?” _

“Kurt, I don't even want to know how you know that,” Lorna sighed. “Christ, I don't want to go. I really, really, don't, but if you think it’d help, I could force myself. For a day, mind you, and I’m not the only one who’ll need a few more before we can go anywhere.”

“We are nowhere near setting a date for anything,” Katje said. “Rescue and cleanup has to happen. You tell your siblings to rest and recover. You all did more than enough.”

 

~

 

Someone might have enjoyed the next week, but Katje was not among them. Neither, by association, were Gavin and Julifer. Sharley, as ever, was difficult to read.

The trio went to Dodoma City in Tanzania, to meet with Tanzania’s President and Prime Minister. Katje had been pretty adamant that this be a Tanzanian show, with the DMA acting as support staff to keep their prisoner under control. There was still no final death toll, and probably wouldn’t be for weeks to come; though the volcano had stopped erupting, it had still buried an unfortunate amount of the country under a layer of ash of varying depth. 

Mindful of the heat, she was smart enough to wear a few very thin cool packs at strategic places under her clothes (a black suit this time, though with her signature red lipstick). Gavin didn't own a suit, and there was no time to scare up one in his size; he had to settle for his one pair of black jeans and a grey button-down, while Julifer had at least found black jeans and a somewhat muted Led Zeppelin shirt. At least they looked reasonably presentable, even if nobody had even tried to talk Sharley out of her typical jeans and tank top.

They’d had to go through the Madagascar Door, as Dodoma City was almost three hundred miles south of Arusha, and overland travel was still difficult at best. It meant a boat and then a drive, because airplanes were still avoiding much of Tanzanian airspace.

Katje couldn’t blame them. Even this far away from Kilimanjaro, the sky was cast faintly orange, and a fine dusting of ash still lingered alongside the road. Surely the weather-manipulators had some sort of plan; she tended to leave that sort of thing to them, and just be glad if it got ran past her at some point. Weather-patterns — and the consequences of messing with them — were not her forte.

“I hope this building has air conditioning,” Julifer said. “It’s been too long since Miranda kept the part of the DMA where we lived a sauna. I’m not used to real heat anymore.”

“I dunno,” Gavin said. “No humidity. Beats L.A. hands down.”

“Yes, rub it in, why don't you,” Katje said crossly. She smoothed her expression into something suitably serious as their car approached the President’s residence, Ikulu. The lawn had slightly overgrown, probably because its light coating of ash would have fatally choked any lawnmower’s engine, but it was lush and green, and someone had probably snowblown the driveway — surely some Norwegian could have provided one.

The house itself was rather too grand for the term. Normally it would have been white, but it too had a powdery grey coating right now — it was made up of three wings, each of two storeys, and faced with lines of beautiful arches. There seemed to be shockingly little security, though she supposed it just meant they couldn’t see most of it.  Only two plainclothes guards stood at the doorway, both wearing paper painter’s masks. It made their expressions difficult to read, but their eyes went tight with anxiety when they saw Sharley. The poor woman tended to have that effect on people, but there didn't seem to be a whole lot she could do about it.

They were expected, so they were waved right through after cursory, surface telepathic scanning, and a look through the bag they’d brought (some of Geezer’s home brew, packed with ice). Unsurprisingly, nobody even asked to scan Sharley. Even if it had been possible, no one really wanted to know just what was in her head.

A tired young man in a somewhat rumpled suit met them in the lobby. "They are waiting" he said, by way of greeting.

"They don't need to wait any longer," Katje said. She wondered how much sleep either had managed since the eruption.

When their little group reached the main office, she would guess it was as little as she’d had. Like every government Katje was aware of, they had a ‘half and half’ system: if the President was Gifted, the Prime Minister (or Vice President, or whatever) was a normal, or vice versa. Though the ratio of Gifted to normal was closing in on fifty-fifty, a great many of those were small children; normal adults still far outnumbered their Gifted counterparts, but somehow they made it work. The War had showed them just what happened if society broke down, after all, and nobody sane wanted to go back to that.

“We brought beer,” Katje said, and held up the bag. “Home-brewed, no store crap.” In all her dealings with Tanzania since the eruption, she’d realized that standing on ceremony was not needed, at least in private.

“You are a blessing.” The President’s name was Emma Ghaldiyali, which was a surname even Katje struggled to pronounce at first. A tall woman, somewhere in her early forties, with a fairly benign Gift of chlorokinesis (unsurprisingly, those with less frightening Gifts tended to win elections), she wore not a suit, but a cream linen dress with a blazer over the top.

“That’s not a term usually applied to us, but we will take it.” Though it was midmorning here, it was quite late in the DMA, and she would happily count that as beer o’clock. Once everyone had been seated, she distributed it with an ever-so-slight flourish.

“There are no impediments now,” Emma said. “If we can contain the prisoner, we can go forward as scheduled.”

“That’s why we have her,” Julifer said, and pointed at Sharley (with her bottle, of course). “Sharley doesn’t sleep, and since she’s strong enough to overpower Lorna, she can keep Ashley in line.”

Both President and Prime Minister glanced at Sharley, who was doing her level best not to come across as utterly unsettling. It didn't actually work, but at least she tried.

“What are you doing with the terrakinetics you caught?” Katje asked.

Emma sighed. “We don't have any real choice but to execute them,” she said. “We still do not have a final death toll, and even with Gifted help, it will be years before Moshi can be inhabited again.”

“We’ve had to keep their location a secret,” the Prime Minister added. His age was impossible to guess, though the grey in his hair would suggest he was older. “There are many who would tear them apart if it was known. I cannot blame them, but that is vengeance, not justice. If we don't do this the right way...that is what you call a slippery slope.”

“Were they all acting of their own free will?” Katje asked. “Nobody was coerced?”

“Not that we have found so far. Their reasons are not all the same, but they were all willing,” Emma said.

“Wonderful,” Katje sighed. “Do you have somewhere you want to keep her, for the trial?”

“Bring your beer,” Emma said, “and I will show you.”

The hallways she led them through were weirdly deserted. Katje would have expected a hive of activity, but here it was quiet and somber, and funereal in a way that made her inwardly frown. This had to be, at least partly, what that Ashley wanted, and Katje silently vowed that it wasn't going to last. She didn't care if she had to round up every empath, aura-manipulator, and telepath she could get her hands on  Tanzania was getting a boost of telepathic and emotional Xanax.

“This is our emergency holding cell.” The Prime Minister halted them at a nondescript door, which he opened with a solid iron key  no technopath was getting in or out of it. The room on the other side was all but identical to the cells in the DMA: windowless, featureless, with bed, toilet, and sink. No table, though, but it wasn't made to be occupied long-term.

“Depressing,” Sharley said. “I approve. Just get me an armchair or something, will you? Standing all that time would get...annoying.”

President and Prime Minister gave her another nervous glance. Sharley was such a fixture in the DMA and the Duncan household that Katje often forgot just what she was really like on first meeting, but really, the poor woman’s pale, scarred self seemed to have hopped right out of the Uncanny Valley to say ‘hi.’

“I can stick around, too,” Gavin said. “Just because.” He didn't need to say that others might feel better about having a lurking Sharley if she wasn't alone. The faint but visible relief on the President’s and Prime Minister’s faces told him he was right, too.

“Parliament meets in three days,” Emma said. “There are media coming from all over the world. This will be...I hope it will be enough. I hope this does not happen again, somewhere else.”

“Oh, trust me,” Sharley said, and her tone was so strange that even Katje stared at her, “it won’t.”

 

~

 

Lorna had indeed gone to one day of the trial, but Pat and Siobhan stayed home to help Mick get his extended family settled. Most of them opted to stay in the DMA, which had areas kept at temperatures better suited to them, but Mick, Saida, and the children were staying with Siobhan.

The morning had been chilly, but they’d stayed warm enough as they hauled furniture. Eris and her twins had taken their beds when they moved, so three new ones had to be scrounged, along with bed linens and towels and all the other shit Pat had already brought with him when he moved in with Lorna and Ratiri.

Zahra and Jamie didn't seem to know what to make of this new, strange, very green place, so much colder than their own home, and this house so unlike theirs.

“Come on, the pair’v you.” Mairead had come down to supervise and, more importantly, feed everyone; she stood now in Siobhan’s stone-and-granite kitchen, like some ginger giant (being short, Siobhan had tailored her kitchen to her height, and Mairead had almost a foot on her). “I’ve made biscuits and there’s some rejects, so you’d best help me eat them before anyone else sees.”

Both of them stared at her, but accepted the biscuits — she’d made snickerdoodles — and nibbled in silence. White people were hardly a rarity in Tanzania, thanks to its Norse guests, but few people anywhere had hair as bright a red as Mairead’s.

“When do we go home?” Zahra asked.

Mairead sighed. She didn't know what they had or hadn't been told yet, but she drew them both to sit at the table (pine, hand sanded and finished by Siobhan, naturally). Sun streamed through the windows, filtered through boughs that cast dappled shadows over the kitchen. “Well, allanah, we don't know yet,” she said. “We don't know when the mess will be cleaned up, so for now you’ve got a new home here. If you stay long enough, you’ll get to see snow.”

Both children visibly perked up at that. Moshi rarely approached anything the Irish would consider cold, and the mountain’s inhabitants would consider all of Tanzania’s winters to be downright balmy. The only snow to be had was far up the mountain — much further than they’d ever gone. “Are there sleds?” Zahra asked.

“Loads’v them. Your cousins are out with them all day.”

Said cousins came barreling through the mud room, though at least they stopped to take their shoes off, so they wouldn’t drag in _ actual _ mud. Each one carried a rucksack over their shoulder.

“Okay, so we know you guys didn't get to bring much stuff,” Saoirse said, “so we brought you some. Clothes, toys, shoes, that kind’v shite.”

Zahra looked down at Jamie. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.


End file.
